The Next Fullmetal Alchemist
by animejunkie121
Summary: My name is Nora Elric,the eldest daughter to Edward and Winry. My life was normal and happy, until my younger sister decided to try and do the impossible. Because of her actions, my life starts to unravel. To find answers to the questions created by my sister, I become a state alchemist, which ends up being one of the worst decisions I could make.M to be safe (on hiatus)
1. Prologue

Prologue

* * *

I ran downstairs, holding one of my dad's books. He was sitting on the couch waiting for me.

"Daddy!" I called.

"Did you find a book you want me to read to you?" he asked, turning around.

"Yup!" I handed him the book. He looked at it for a second, then looked at me.

"Where did you find this?" he asked, his tone was not quite angry, but he wasn't happy ether.

I looked down at my bare feet. "The bookcase."

"Nora. which bookcase?"

I didn't answer.

"Did you go into my room?" he asked, kneeling to the floor so that he was almost eye level with me.

"Maybe..." I said in a small voice.

"Nora!" he snapped. "How many times do I have to tell you not to go looking at the books in my room!"

"I'm sorry daddy."

"What happened now?" a voice said from the kitchen. It was my mom. She had just finished baking an apple pie, and you could smell it from the living room.

Dad stood up. "Nora went in to our room again and grabbed this." He handed the book to her.

She looked at it for a second before reading the title aloud. "Beginners Guide to Alchemy." Mom looked at me, then dad. "Whats wrong with her having this?" She asked.

"She went into our room to get it." Dad answered.

"Ed." She paused. "Its a beginners guide. I don't see the harm in her having this."

Dad looked a bit surprised by her answer. "Thats not the point Winry, she-"

Before he could finish his sentience, mom kneeled down to the floor to talk to me. "Do you want daddy to teach you about alchemy?" She asked.

"Yes!" I replied. "Daddy and Uncle Al are always talking about it, and I want to know what they're talking about!"

Mom stood up, then turned to dad, "Come on Ed, teach her."

"W-what?" He seemed confused.

"Teach her about alchemy." She repeated.

"But, she-" He started again. but mom cut him off.

"Its not like she grabbed one of your research books, its the beginners guild. Just teach the basics and then if she wants to learn more, Al can teach her what you can't."

My dad looked stunned by my mom's response. Then he looked at me and said, "Do you really want to learn about alchemy?"

"Yes! I want to be just like you and Uncle Al and I want to know everything about alchemy!"

He looked at me strait in the eyes, before sighing. Then he said, "Alright then, I'll teach you about alchemy."

"Yea!" I cried, then jumped on the couch and patted the spot next to me, "Come on daddy!"

He laughed a little before sitting down. My mom handed the book back to him. "I'll go and get you two a slice of apple pie." then she left for the kitchen.

"Alright then, lets begin." Dad opened the book. "Chapter one, the laws of alchemy."

And at the age of 5, I received my very first lesson in alchemy from my dad, Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist.


	2. Chapter one

Chapter one

10 years later

I found myself running to the train station I was so excited one summer afternoon in Resembool. The sun was beating down from the middle of the sky, causing heat waves to rise from the ground, and there were clouds to stop the heat. But I didn't care. I couldn't wait to see my dad again after his trip to Central. I wanted to show him the new alchemy technique I learned from Al and Mai. When I arrived at the station, the train hadn't come in yet.

"Nora!" two voices called from behind me. I turned around, still running were my two younger siblings, Valerie and Adam. Adam was the middle child out of the three of us, at 12. He was still wearing a pale blue t-shirt, which almost perfectly matched his eyes, and jean shorts. His hair was short and the same shade of blonde as Mom. And although normally his eyes were a nice sky blue, on occasion they had a small tint of gold in them. Valerie was, of course, the youngest at 11. She had long hair matched the color of Dad's but her roots were brown. And she had the same gold eyes as Dad too. She still in her P.J.'s.

It was a wonder to me that we were siblings. Unlike the two of them, who had similar, if not the same traits as our parents, I looked nothing alike. I was the palest in the family, although I spent the most time outside. I had fiery red hair cut to my chin, that you could spot from a mile away, and my eyes were a bright emerald green. And in comparison the what they were wearing, I was in a white tank-top and black jeans and combat boots, as that was my normal outfit.

"Why do you have to run so fast?" said Valerie, clearly out of breath. "I mean, you literally, left us in the dust when you found out dad was coming. You didn't even me a chance to change."

"Yeah, couldn't you wait a few seconds?" Adam exclaimed.

"Sorry guys." I said, rubbing the back of my head sheepishly. "I just really want to talk to dad about that technique Al and Mai showed me the other day. And it's not my fault you decided to spend the whole day in pajamas Val."

Adam rolled his eyes and Valerie stuck out her tongue.

The train finally pulled up, causing my hair to blow into my face. I spun around, and waited for the train to stop. I looked up and down the train to see where dad would get off. At the end of the train, I saw dad walk off holding three bags.

"Dad!" we called simultaneously. I let Val and Adam go in front of me, to make up for getting here first.

He turned and smiled when he saw us. "Hey guys!" He dropped his bags to gave Adam and Val a big hug. "Sorry, I was gone so long, I didn't think that they would make me stay in Central for almost a month."

"Its okay," said Adam, "we're just happy you're back!"

"Did you get us anything in Central?" asked Val.

Dad laughed. "Yes, I did, but let's wait until after dinner, okay?"

Adam and Val signed. "Do you want us to carry a bag back?" They asked at the same time.

"You can, if you want. But be careful, they are a little heavy." He replied.

Adam and Val nodded, then each grabbed a bag and started walking. I walked towards Dad as they walked passed me, and was finally able to get a good look at him. He had his usually brown trench coat over his right arm, and the sleeves of his white collared shirt were rolled up past his elbows, and long brown pants with brown dress shoes. His hair was pulled back into a ponytail, instead of a braid which he normally wore, probably to keep his hair off his neck. And you could clearly see the sweat on his face.

"Hey Nora." He waved at me.

"Hey Dad, I'm glad you're home." I said back with a smile.

He picked up the last bag that was next to him. "Me too. I think the air in Central was starting to get to me. I feel like I haven't slept in a week."

"Are you going to be okay?" I asked.

"Yeah, I'll be fine, I just need some sleep and some of your mom's cooking."

"Yeah, I think mom said that she was making stew tonight."

"Really?" A smile spread across his face. "I love her stew!"

I laughed a little. "So, why were you called into Central anyway?" I asked as we started walking. "You left on such short notice that we never got a reason."

"At first it was just to oversee the start of a new research project, but it turned into a ton of paperwork and meetings."

I looked at him for a second. _Really?_ I thought with a raised eyebrow. _If that's true, he would have so found a way out of it._ Dad was terrible at lying on the spot, his voice raised ever so slightly, plus he always looked straight ahead when he was telling a lie.

"That must have sucked." I responded with a shrug. If he was lying, it probably was because I wasn't allowed to know.

"Yeah, and on top of that, Mustang was there too." Dad said, sounding vexed.

"The Brigadier General?" I pressed.

"Yeah, but he was promoted recently, so now he's Major General Roy Mustang." He said the last part the way a child would if they were making fun of someone. "He's so annoying!" He added.

"How's Ashbel doing?" I asked, changing the subject. Ashbel was the only son to Roy and Riza. He was 20 years old, and was a flame alchemist like his father. I hadn't seen him since my last birthday, and to be honest I had a small crush on him.

"He's doing okay, according to Riza. Right now he's stationed in southern headquarters, so he wasn't in Central while I was there." Dad replied as we came up to the house. Adam and Valerie were already on the front porch, waiting for us.

"Come on Dad!" Adam called. "Dinner's ready!"

"What's for dinner?" Dad called back.

"Stew!" Valerie answered.

"Yes! I love your mother's stew!" Then Dad started running. "Come on Nora!"

"Coming!" I laughed, and started running after him.

Dinner was consumed in a heartbeat, as mom's stew was always the best. After dinner was cleaned up, Dad handed out the things he had gotten for us in Central.

"First, for you Winry." Dad pulled out a medium size box and handed it to Mom.

"You didn't have to get me anything Ed." She said as she looked at the box.

"I had to get this, the second I saw it I thought of you." Dad said with a sly smile.

Mom looked at him for a second before opening the box. inside the box was a new auto-mail tool she had be asking, no begging, to get for ages. Once she realized what it was she started freaking out, like a young child that got what they really wanted for their birthday.

"Oh my god, Ed! Thank you so much!" She squealed, leaning in to kiss Dad on the cheek

"I'm glad you like it Winry." Dad smiled.

Next, Dad handed Adam a bag. "This one is for you Adam."

Adam took it eagerly. Inside the bag as a large star map and a couple of books on astronomy, as that was Adam's favorite type of science. Adam looked up and gave Dad a smile, "Thanks, Dad."

Dad smiled back and nodded. "I wanted to get you a telescope that I saw, but it was to big for me to bring home by myself."

"It's okay, besides you don't really need a telescope out here anyway. You can see almost all the stars" Adam replied.

Dad nodded again, then grabbed two small boxes and handed both of the to Valerie. "These are for you."

Val took the boxes and looked at them for a second before opening them. Inside one box was a pair of small gold hoop earrings and in the other was a silver chain necklace with a small moon pendant. She looked at them for a minute before saying to Dad, "Thank you."

I looked over her shoulder to see them. "Those are really pretty." I said. Valerie's response was just a sigh. I looked at her face, and you could very clearly see the disappointment she had for what she got, like she was expecting some big extravagant gift. I rolled my eyes but said nothing. Val was always a bit of a spoiled brat when it came to getting gifts.

"And this is for you Nora." Dad said holding me a flat wooden box.

I took the box, and stared at it for a minute. The box was made of a dark wood, with a clear stain to make it shiny. The lid of the box had a very intricate rose design, and on the sides of the box had vines to match the top. I looked back at Dad a little confused.

"Open it." He said with a wide smile.

I looked back down at the box, and lifted the small hinge that held it close. Inside the box was lined with a dark purple velvet, and in the center of the box sat silver necklace with a flamel pendent and a silver pocket watch next to it. I gasped.

"Dad... this is..."

"Yup, that's my old state alchemist pocket watch, I had it fixed while I was in Central. The necklace is actually from my old alchemy teacher Izumi, I ran into her and Sig the first day I got there. I told them how well your lessons were going, and Izumi gave me that, they were originally going to give it to you for your birthday but they couldn't make it out here."

 _My birthday_ , I thought absently, then I started laughing.

Dad raised an eyebrow. "What's so funny?" He asked.

I looked at him smiling, "I completely forgot that today was my birthday!"

Everyone looked a bit shocked as I continued laughing. They looked back and forth between one another.

"You know, I think that we all forgot about that." said Mom. After hearing her say that I laughed even harder, and soon enough everyone was laughing.

After I got all the laughs out of my system, I stood up and walked over to Dad. "Thank you Dad." I said and gave him a hug.

"You're welcome Nora, and Happy 16th birthday."


	3. Chapter two

Chapter two

After having some of mom's apple pie, I went up to my room, holding the box carefully against my chest. When I got to my room, I sat down on the bed and opened the box again. I looked at the watch and flamel for a long minute. I still couldn't believe that Dad had given me his old pocket watch, it symbolized so much to him and to Al. They had been through so much, and fought so hard to get back to normal. I felt bad that Dad had decided to give the watch to me.

I pick up the watch and flipped it over a few times in my hand, before pressing to button on top to open it. The cover swung down to show the inside. The face was just a plain white and the numbers were Roman numerals, and on the back of the cover was inscribed 'Don't Forget 3. Oct 11'. I raised an eyebrow, _why was that date important?_ I wondered.

Then there was a quiet knock at my door, I looked up and saw that it was Valerie. "Hey Val, you can come in."

She entered the room and closed the door almost all the way behind her. She looked upset about something.

"What's up?" I asked.

"Why did you get that?" She asked. She was looking at the watch in my hand.

"What?" I was confused by the question.

"Why did you get that?" She asked again.

"Because Dad gave it to me." I said with a questioning tone. I didn't really understand what she was asking.

"That's not what I mean." Val said, shaking her head.

"Then tell me what you mean." I replied, with an eye roll.

"Why did he have to give that to you? Why not me or Adam? Why you?"

Now I was lost. "What are you getting at Val? Are you saying that you think that you or Adam should have gotten the watch?"

If this was the case, this wasn't new, Val was always jealous when she thought that someone got a better gift than her, whether it was me or Adam.

She said nothing for a minute. Then snapped her head up, her face a bright red, and tears running down her cheeks. "Why are you his favorite?!" Her voice cracked.

I was stunned into silence. "Wait, what?" was all I could manage.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about!" She continued. "Whenever Dad gets back from a trip or something, he always makes time just for you! He completely ignores me and Adam half the time and when he does pay attention to us he's only half listening! But when he's talking to you he's all ears!"

After recovering from the initial shock, I let her rant for a minute. If I said anything or interrupted her, she would just get even more pissed off. She had gone on these types of rants before, claiming that she wasn't getting enough attention, and the rants were mostly about Dad.

"And on top of everything, you think that just because Dad pays more attention to you then us that you're somehow special!" She snapped. My ear twitched. "All you ever do is study. Study, study, study! You never help around the house, leaving all the work to me or Adam or Mom, and your excuse is always the same thing 'I was studying'!" The last part she said in a mocking tone.

That's when I had heard enough. "Oh, shut up already!" I snapped.

She stopped for a second and I continued. "Do you honestly think that I'm Dad's favorite? _Please_!"

My ear twitched from some background noise, but I didn't really notice. "First of all, the every _idea_ that he only really talks to me is stupid. He and Adam talk all the time! And it's not like it's forced, Adam goes to all the time, hell, while Dad was away, Adam talked to him more than I did!"

Valerie looked at me, completely stunned. She probably was just expecting me to sit there and listen, but not talk back.

"And another thing." I went on. "Dad _tries_ to talk to you all the time! You're just never paying attention! Whenever he wants to talk, you're locked up in your room reading."

She opened her mouth to stop me but I put my hand up and continued. "And I do help around the house. Who do you think cleans up your mess of a room? Or the mess you make downstairs? Who makes dinner when Mom doesn't really feel like it? Who picks up your plate when you leave it at the table? _ME_! I do more work around the house in a week then you do in a month!"

"That's not-" Val started.

But I cut her off, "And the only reason I am studying all the time is because one day I want to be a State Alchemist, so I have to study every type of alchemy there is, and stay up to date in regards to the latest theories. I want to make something of myself one day, unlike you, who just hides away from everything and stays in your own little bubble and thinks that everything you want or need in life will just be handed to you on a big silver platter!"

I didn't realize that I had gotten to my feet at some point, until I sat back down on the bed and let out a big sigh. I looked at Valerie, she still had the tear stains on her cheeks but she had stopped crying. Now she looked furious, like she was ready the tackle me.

She turned and was ready to storm out of my room when a breeze came through and the door opened. And on the other side was Adam, he had been eavesdropping on us. He jumped a little as the door opened all the way, then he froze when he saw that Val and I looking at him. Valerie just looked at him the same way she looked at me, enraged, and just stormed passed him, went into her room and slammed her door. He watched her go passed him, then looked back at me. I waved for him to come in.

He came in and left the door open. I looked at him for a minute before asking, "How much did hear?"

He was silent for a moment then answering while rubbing the back of his head, "Pretty much all of it."

I sighed. "Can you please not tell Mom or Dad about it?"

He gave a short nod. "Believe me, if I told them about it, it would just lead to more yelling."

"Where are they anyway?"

"They went out for a walk, to the cemetery I think."

Winry and I walked hand in hand down to the cemetery, Winry holding one bucay of flowers and I holding another. When we arrived, the sun had started to set, causing the sky to turn different shades of orange and pink. Winry walked over where her parents were and place down the bucay. She kneeled there for a minute with her eyes closed and her hands folded before standing up and walking with me over to my parents. I placed the bucay in between the headstones before standing up and taking a step back. The sunlight made the front of the headstones dark.

On our way back to the house, Winry looked at me with worry in her eyes.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Do you think we should tell her soon?"

"Tell who what?" I asked, playing dumb.

"Ed, you know what." She said, rolling her eyes.

"Oh, that..." I looked straight ahead. "I don't know."

"We're going to have to tell her eventually."

"Do we?" I asked. "I mean, we raised her from when she was a baby. It's not like she has some vague memories of someone else as her parents."

"Ed, think about it." Winry looked at me with tired eyes. "She looks nothing like us. She has red hair and green eyes. She bound to notice someday. I'm surprised she hasn't noticed already."

I sighed. "I feel like if we tell her, she might feel like she doesn't belong with us." I paused for a second then said, "What if she wants to meet him? There is no way I will let that, that animal get anywhere near her."

Winry sighed. "That's for her to decide Ed."

I looked down at my feet. "I just... I don't want her to not think of us as her parents, you know?"

"I know Ed, I feel the same way. But still, she has a right to know."

I squeezed her hand lightly and she squeezed back. "Okay, then. I think that I should be the one to tell her."

"Okay." Winry leaned against my arm as we came up to the house.

"I'll tell Nora tomorrow when we go out to spare in the fields that she's adopted."


	4. Chapter three

The next morning, I woke up extra early to get ready for what Dad and I had planned for the day. We were suppose to spend most of the day sparing out in the fields by where Dad's old house was. I don't really remember when we started doing this, but it became something we would do the day after he got back from a trip. After I finished getting dressed in my normal outfit of a white tank top and black jeans, I went downstairs to start making a lunch. By the time Dad woke up, the sun had just finished rising and I was ready to go.

I sat on the couch in the living room impatiently waiting for him to finish his breakfast that I had put out for him. "Come on Dad, I want to go already."

"Calm down Nora. Yeesh, I mean like really, can't you show a little restraint?" Dad said as put a fork-full of fruit in his mouth.

"When you're not home I have no one to spare with! I can't spare with Adam because he's too small and weak and Val never wants to leave her room." I moaned.

"What about when Al and Mai are over?"

"The rare times they are here, I just ask if there is anything new they can teach me."

Dad sighed as he washed his bowl in the sink.

I looked at the table. "Dad."

"Yes Nora?"

"You forget about your milk."

His body stiffened for a second, then he slowly turned around. "I hate milk..." He muttered.

I laughed. "Fine then, I'll drink it." I walked over to the table and chugged the milk.

Dad looked at me for a second, "I just don't understand how you can drink milk like that." He grimaced. "It's so gross."

"I like milk. What's wrong with that?" I said as I walked over to put away the cup.

"Sometimes I wonder if you're really my daughter." He said jokingly, while shaking his head. Then, as if remembering something he'd rather forget, his body stiffened.

I nudged him playfully. "You know, I'm not the only that likes milk, Adam drinks it too. We probably get it from Al."

It took a moment for Dad to loosen up. "Yeah, you're right." He said with a nervous laugh. "Come on, let's go." He gestured to the door.

It was a long walk from our house to the fields, but to me it was always worth it. When we arrived at the place where Dad's old house was, we stopped for a minute. There was no longer any rubble left over, all that was left of the house now was the foundation that it once stood on.

I looked at Dad for a minute as he stared at where his house once was. "Why did you do it?" I asked. I felt like every time we came here I asked this question, but I always felt that every time Dad would give me a different answer, and that maybe a small part of him regretted doing it, although I thought that he would never admit it.

"Sometimes I ask myself that." He answered.

I turned to him with a raised eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

He was silent for a moment before answering. "Sometimes I think back and wonder why we did what we did. We knew that what we were doing was wrong, and I think that somewhere in the back of our minds we knew that it wouldn't work, but we tried anyway. And we paid the price for it. I think that we burned down this house because we were running. Not just because we thought that if we did this we wouldn't have a home to come back to, but because we wanted to forget, we wanted to hide and get rid of any evidence of our crime. We were so young and naive..." He trailed off after that.

I looked into his eyes, they seemed almost glazed over, from that I could tell he was lost in the past. "Come on Dad," I said, nudging him. " If we stand here all day we won't get anything done."

He snapped out of his reverie. "Sorry, you're right. Plus," A wide smile formed on his face. "I still need to teach you a thing or two after what happened last time."

"Are you still sore about that?" I said playfully.

"Yes! I couldn't bend over right for a week!" He responded, smiling a little.

"What I did was fair game." I shrugged. "Besides, I didn't think that you such an old man." I added with a sly smile.

"I am not old!" He snapped. "Now you're really going to get in!"

He started to run ahead, like a child trying to win a race. I laughed, then ran after him, but when I got to the top of the hill, I stopped for a second and turned around. I could still see the old foundation. I looked at it and wondered, would I have done what Dad and Al did? Even if I knew the consequences?

"Come on Nora!" Dad called.

"Coming!" I called back, leaving the blank foundation behind.

When I got to the top of the hill where Dad was standing, I put down the basket I was holding that had our lunches in it. I let the air sink into my lungs for a minute, before looking at Dad.

"You ready?" I asked, smiling.

"You bet! Bring it on!" He took his stance.

I scanned him over to look for an opening and found one. I lunged. He threw a punch but I dodged it, and landed a kick on his rib cage. He staggered for a second and I landed another hit, this time hitting the center of his rib cage.

"Damn it Nora." Dad said trying to catch his breath. "Why do you always go for the cheep shots?"

"They're not cheap shots, you're just getting old." I said as I bounced back and forth on my feet.

He glowered at me for a second before running at me again, ready to land a hit. He threw another punch, this time I ducked under it and grabbed him at his elbow and under his arm. I twisted his arm around to his back and went to kick his knee out. But I kicked his automail and stubbed my toe. I jumped back and kneeled to the ground.

"Crap." I muttered.

"Ha!" Dad laughed. "You always make that mistake."

"Because I always forget that you have automail."

"How do you forget I have automail?" He said with a laugh.

"Shut up." I muttered. "Damn, that hurt."

"You okay?" He asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine." I said. I stood up and shook off the pain, then ran full speed at Dad, taking a chance opening.

This time as I went to throw a punch and Dad blocked it. I moved out of the way before he could land a hit on me. I was standing about a yard away from him. The sun had moved from just below the treetops to the middle of the sky. Dad started to circle around me, looking for an opening. I watched him as he moved, he was cautious, like he was trying to find a way to hit me without hurting me. Then he stopped in front of me and came at me. I jumped back, dodging his kick, then countered with my own. I jumped up and used my right leg, but he blocked it with his arm. Dad pushed my leg away and then grabbed it at my ankle and my knee. He swung me around then tossed me in the air. I flipped in the air and landed on my feet but I slipped and fell.

Dad didn't wait a second, he came and went to land a downwards kick on me. But I caught it, and shoved it up and away from me. I rolled over, and got to my feet.

"You're getting really good." Said Dad, panting a bit. "I'm surprised that you aimed for my head with that kick, I didn't think that you could reach."

My ear twitched slightly. "What's that suppose to mean?"

"I'm just saying that I didn't think that would be able to reach because you're kinda shor-"

I didn't even let him finish the word. "I AM NOT SHORT!"

I ran at him, and jumped again. This time I swung my left leg at his head and it made contact with Dad's jaw and it sent him to the ground.

He looked at me stunned for a second while holding his cheek. "Damn Nora, calm down."

"That's what you get for calling me short." I said, turning away abruptly. "Now let's have lunch, I'm hungry."

I went over to where I put the basket down and walked back over to where Dad was still on the ground and sat down next to him.

"So what is it this time?" Dad asked, moving over a little and still holding his cheek.

"I have some leftover apple pie Mom made yesterday, some seasoned corn-on-the-cob, cold." I listed the things as I pulled them out of the basket. "two water bottles, some pasta salad, and some BLT with ham sandwiches."

"You made all of this?" Dad looked at me, a little surprised.

"The sandwiches I made this morning, the rest of it I made a few days ago, when Al and Mai were here. And the apple pie is obviously leftover from yesterday"

"Dang Nora, I didn't know that you could cook." Dad said amazed as I handed him a plate.

"You make it sound like all I ever do is study and practice alchemy." As I put some pasta salad on my plate I remembered what happened last night with Valerie.

"You know what I was thinking." I started, looking down at my food.

"Hm?" Dad looked at me with his mouth full. "What?" He said after he swallowed.

"Maybe next time we do something like this, we should have everyone come with us." I suggested, still looking down.

"Yeah that would be nice." Dad agreed with a nod as he grabbed more pasta salad. "It's been awhile since we last had a real family picnic."

"Yeah, I think it would be fun!" I said, finally looking up, with a smile. I had to admit the last part was a bit of a lie. I felt like if everyone else was here, I wouldn't get to talk to Dad as much. But at the same time, that's why I mentioned the idea. Because I knew that some of what Valerie had said to me last night was true. That I did like to keep all of Dad's attention.

After that, I told Dad what had happened while he was away. It wasn't a lot, but he still wanted to know. When I told him about the new technique that Al and Mai had showed me, he got really excited.

"Can you show me?" He asked eagerly.

I thought for a second. "I can try." I said with a shrug.

I stood up, and looked around for a stick that I could use. I found one, and started to draw two alkahestry circles, each a little ways apart. What I finished, I looked it over to make sure that I did it right. The circles themselves were basic alkahestry circles, but what made the transmutation complicated was that I had to redirect my chi, or my energy, from my hand down to the ground without touching it. I had seen Al do this with normal alchemy, but what I was trying to do was a mix of alchemy and alkahestry. Plus, the technique wasn't perfected yet so there was a chance that either nothing would happen or it would rebound.

I stood over the circle and closed my eyes to focus. I could feel what Mai called the Dragon's Pulse running under my feet, and where the circle was, the Pulse was the strongest. It seemed to rise up from the ground a little into the air. I put my hand out over the circle and tried to redirect my chi to where the the Dragon's Pulse hung in the air. I waited and focused.

Suddenly, I felt my chi and the Pulse make contact. I opened my eyes and watched as a Xingese style sword formed from the ground at the other circle. When the transmutation was complete, I walked over to where the sword I had made was on the ground and picked it up. The sword was surprisingly detailed, and was perfectly balanced.

Dad stood up and walked over to me. He took the sword from me and looked it over closely. Then he smiled and said, "That was really good Nora!"

I felt my body relax, although I didn't realize that I had tensed up. "To be honest, I though it wasn't going to work." I said rubbing the back of my head.

"Please, you pulled it off perfectly!" He handed the sword back to me. I looked up at his face, and for some reason he looked sad.

"Dad, what's wrong?" I asked.

"Nora," He paused. "There's something I have to tell you."

"What is it?"

But before Dad could say anything, we heard a voice in the distance calling for us. I turned around and saw Adam running up the hill to where Dad and I was. I looked up at the sky, it was a fading blue with pink and orange highlights, and the sun was just below the tree tops again. I was surprised, I hadn't realized it had gotten so late.

"Dad! Nora!" Adam called as he came to meet us.

"Hey Adam. What's up? Are we late for dinner?" I asked.

He shook his head. It took a moment for me to notice that he was out of breath, and he seemed a bit panicked.

"What is it, Adam?" Dad asked. He could tell something was wrong.

"Its... Its Valerie." Adam panted.

"What happened?"

"She... She's gone."

"What do you mean she's gone?" I asked. My stomach knotted and I felt my heart start pounding away on my rib cage. _I have a very bad feeling about this..._ I thought to myself.

"She ran away." Adam had finally regained enough air to speak normally. "She and Mom had an argument about something, and afterwards she went up to her room. Later, after I had helped Mom make dinner, I went up to check on her, and she was gone."

My breathing became short, jagged breaths. _Why? Why would she run away? Just because of an argument with Mom?_ My mind was racing with a thousand different questions. _That doesn't make sense though, she and mom argue all the time. There had to be more to it..._

"And that's not the worst of it." Adam added..

"How can it get much worst!" Dad snapped, running his hand through his hair.

"She went into your rooms and took all the alchemy notes she could find." Adam said, his eyebrows turning into one line.

"What?!" Dad froze. "What did she take from my room!?"

"Most of the books from the top shelves."

"Crap!" Dad suddenly ran passed Adam and I back towards the house.

Adam and I started to follow. As we were running I asked, "What did she take from my room?"

"I don't really know." Adam answered. "When I went into your room there were just papers everywhere."

We came up to the house, and burst through the front door.

"Ed!" Mom called. She came out of the living room, but Dad had gone straight upstairs to his room to look over the damage. Everyone followed.

Dad's room was a mess. Papers and books were everywhere. And all of the books from the top of his bookcase were gone. "Damn it!" he snapped, slamming his fist against the wall, causing everyone to jump.

The books in the top of his bookcase were never to be touched. They contended all for Dad's notes about human transmutation, among other dangerous things. _I_ wasn't even supposed to look at them.

"Edward, I- I'm sorry." I turned to look at Mom, she was on the verge of tears. Dad said nothing, he just looked at his ravaged room.

I stood there for another moment, before going to my room. My room was just as bad as Dad's. Papers were ripped and book lay open on the floor. I bent down to look at a page, and as I read it over, I panicked.

"She did a number on your room too."

I turned around, and saw that it was Dad. I turned back to look at everything again. "Yeah, she did."

"What notes did she take from you?" He asked.

"I- I don't really know yet." I responded quickly.

"Do you want help cleaning up?"

"No, I've got it."

I waited for him to walk away before grabbing another page to make sure. I reread the pages I was holding about ten times before I was positive I wasn't reading it wrong. The pages I was holding were part of a new transmutation theory I was working on. The theory consisted of a combination of alkahestry, bio-alchemy and human transmutation. The idea behind it was that, if done right, it could heal any wound or health condition, without any major consequences. Of course, it was still just an idea, I hadn't even finished working out what the transmutation circle would look like.

But that wasn't really the problem. The problem was that no one knew that I was working on it. I had never mentioned it to anyone, especially Dad. If he had found out I even looked at his books he'd kill me. The fact that Valerie knew about them, was what bothered me. What was she planning to do with them? And how did she know about them?

My brain was too tired to try and answer the questions I had. I picked up all the pages and put them back in a box I had had them in before that was under my bed, and put the books that were out back on their shelves. I washed my face, and got ready for bed. As I closed my door, I could hear Mom downstairs, crying, and Dad was trying to comfort her. I remembered that Adam had said something earlier about Val and Mom arguing.

Before I could even begin to think about what they had argued about, I stopped myself. "I can't think about that now." I said aloud. "Right now I need to sleep and then I can think about this in the morning."

I turned off my lights. And as I listened to Mom and Dad downstairs, I slowly fell asleep, and prayed to whatever God there was that Valerie didn't do anything stupid.


	5. Chapter four

It had been three months since Valerie disappeared, and there were still no clues as to where she went or what she was planning. The summer had ended and faded into fall. The leaves on the trees started to fall on the ground, their orange tinge beautifully decorating the surroundings.

I went downstairs one morning, the sun shined through the windows showing all the dust floating around, after a night that consisted of very little sleep and heard Mom and Dad talking to some new voices in the dining room. One was a gruff male voice and the other was a female,her voice was somewhat stern but at the same time calming. I walked in and saw that Mom and Dad were talking to the Mustangs—Roy, Riza and Ashbel—Al was at the table with them as well. I'd forgotten that Al had been staying with us, although it had been a few weeks since he started staying here, at his request so he could help with the search.

I looked down at what I was wearing, I was still in my dirty clothes from the day before. ' _Oh well'_ I thought and went in.

"Morning." I said as I entered the room. My voice was hoarse from being outside and yelling all day.

"Oh, good morning Nora." Dad replied. "You're up early."

I looked at the clock that hang on the wall in the kitchen. "It's 10 o'clock."

Dad looked at the clock, "Oh, right."

It had been like this a lot since Valerie left. No one seemed to know anything anymore. Everyone was disoriented all the time, so much to the point that we would call each other by the wrong names. I had lost track of how many times someone called me Valerie.

"Morning, Nora." Al said with a slight smile. I nodded and smiled back.

"Morning Nora, it's nice to see you," Riza said to me with a small smile.

"Its nice to see you too, Major- I mean Miss Riza"

She laughed a little then smiled. "You don't have to be so formal Nora. I've told you before, you can just call me Riza."

I smiled back. "Right, sorry. I'm just tired, I forget."

I looked at the stern-faced table "Am I interrupting something?" I asked. "If so, I'll go back to my room." I turned to leave.

"No, wait a minute Nora."

I turned back around. "Yes?"

"Can you sit with us for a few minutes?" asked Roy. "There are some questions I'd like to ask you."

I went to the table and sat down in the empty set next to Ashbel, nodded to him a 'good morning' then turned back to Roy. "Ask away."

"From what I understand," Roy started. " Valerie took some of your notes too, right?"

My heart stop for half a second. "Yes." I answered.

"What were those notes on?"

I had to stop myself from biting down on my lip as that was my normal tell for lying, and hoped that my voice wouldn't betray the secrets "They were some of my basic alchemy notes, and some simplified versions of alkahestry notes." What I said wasn't a lie. Some of the notes she took was on that stuff.

"Okay, then. How had Valerie been acting the days before she left?"

I automatically thought back to the fight we had the day before she ran off. "She... she had been..." I tried to find the right words. "She had been feeling deprived. She had trying to get attention."

"What do you mean deprived?" Mom asked. "Deprived of what?"

"Like I said, she wanted attention, like she always did." I paused then added. "She felt like that the world should have been revolving around her."

"Nora!" Dad snapped. "There is no need for you to talk bad about Valerie at a time like this."

"It's the truth! The day before she left, she got really upset at me and you, _Dad,_ for the fact that I had gotten your old pocket watch! We got into a fight about it! She felt like I was your favorite and went into the whole rant about how she felt like that all you cared about was me and that I acted like I was special so that I didn't do anything around that house and a bunch of other crap!"

"Nora, please." Mom cut in. "Why would Valerie get upset about your father giving you his old pocket watch? He had said before that he was eventually going to give it to you, so that fact that you got it wasn't much of a surprise."

"That's not the point! She-"

"Nora, stop this. Just be quiet and let Mustang finish his questions. We will finish talking about this later." Said Dad.

I looked between them for a minute. They didn't believe me, but why? Why would they think that I'd lie at a time like this? I stood up from the table abruptly, "Excuse me."

"Nora, where are you going?" Dad asked.

I didn't answer, I just kept walking to the door.

"Nora! Stop right now!" He snapped. But I ignored him.

I opened the front door. "Nora!" Dad snapped again. "Where do you think you're going! Come back here right now!"

I took one step out the door, then started running. I could hear multiple voices calling me back, but I didn't care. I ran until they faded away. I didn't really know where I was running to, until I found myself at the site of Dad and Al's old house.

The tree next to the lot was mostly barren, but there were a few leaves still trying to hang on. After catching my breath for a minute, I continued running until I was at the river bank. I stood there for a minute before sitting on the ground. The grass still had the morning dew on it, and the sun was working its way into the middle of the sky.

I laid there for a while, just staring at the clouds. I was so angry that Mom and Dad didn't believe me, and I couldn't understand why.

I closed my eyes for a second, listening to the sounds of the river, and when I opened them I saw Ashbel standing over me. I jumped up. "Ash! When did you get there?"

"About two seconds ago." He said, smiling a little. But his smile faded quickly, "Why did you run off?"

I hadn't really gotten a good look at him earlier. I had forgotten how much he looked like his father, with the exception of his eyes, which were the same warm brown as his mother's. So warm, that when I looked into them, it was like looking into a fire, so I looked away. "Why do you care?"

"Because you ran off without saying why, and you made your parents panic." He said, trying to get me to look him in the eye. "Plus," He added, " you don't seem too good."

"What's that suppose to mean?" I snapped, finally looking at him straight in the face. "Of course I'm not good! My sister has been missing for over three months and my parents don't believe me when I tell them something! Why would I lie!"

"That wasn't my point." Ash said as he sat down next to me.

"That what is your point?"

"Have you been sleeping?"

I looked at him for a moment, completely enraged. "Do I look like I've been sleeping? Hell, do I look like I've even been eating!"

"No, that's my point Nora. Being like this isn't going to help any. You need to hold yourself together."

"I can't!" My voice screeched. "My mind is going though a thousand different scenarios about what Valerie is going to do with that notes she took! And the worst part is that no matter how many different things I think up, only one makes sense!"

"And what one is that?" Ashbel seemed to ask more out of courtesy, rather than curiosity.

"I think she's going to try human transmutation." I stared bluntly.

Ashbel looked at me, shocked. He obviously hadn't expected for me to say that. "What?"

"Please don't make me repeat it." I said looking away from him.

"But... how? She doesn't have to alchemic knowledge to pull that off. Besides, from what your Dad said, his notes on that are encrypted, and only he and Al know the key."

"That's not true." I whispered.

"What do you mean?"

"I know the key."

"What!" Ash shouted. "How? Did your Dad tell you?"

"No," I said. "I deciphered it myself once. I've read those books."

Ashbel looked at me stunned. "You... Nora. Tell me that you weren't thinking about trying it."

"No, of course not! I'm not that stupid!" I said, rolling my eyes. "I looked at the books because, I wanted to try make a new type of alchemy out of it."

"How can you make a new type of alchemy out of that?" He asked.

"I don't really know, okay? It was just a theory that I had."

Ashbel shrugged, then looked up at the sky, some clouds had started to move in. "Do you really think that Valerie would try human transmutation?"

"I don't know. But there are two things that I do know. Valerie is the type of person who would do anything to get attention, and she has enough alchemic knowledge to figure out Dad's notes."

"How though? I thought that you were the only one in the house that was studying alchemy."

"Val is a big reader. Every now and then, when she didn't have anything else to do, she would ask for, or take, one of my alchemy books. And she would ask me questions about stuff too. She knows as much about alchemy as I do, for the most part."

I looked up and watched to clouds, "It looks like it's going to rain, maybe we should go back." I grimaced. "I'm going to get an earful."

Ashbel laughed. "That's what you get for running off the way you did. But you're right, we should get going." He stood up and looked over the river, then froze.

"What is it Ash?"

He didn't move, he just kept looking over the river. I followed his gaze, and saw what he was looking at. It was Valerie.

She was standing at the top of the other side of the river bank. She looked as startled to see us as we were to see her. She looked almost exactly the same as the last time I saw her, hair still pulled back in a pony tail, eyes puffy and tired. But there were a few small differences, like her outfit, she was wearing a white button down that looked way too big for her, and her pants were rolled up at the ankles and she wasn't wearing shoes. She was holding a bucket in her hands, and from what I could see it was full of water.

My stomach dropped. "Valerie," I said, standing up slowly. All my emotions hit me at once, anger, confusion, sadness, fear, and a million other different things. "Please, just wait a sec-"

Before I could finish, Valerie turned and ran. "Valerie wait!" I called.

I grabbed a stick that was next to the river and quickly drew a sloppy transmutation circle. I put my hand on it and the ground from the bottom of the river rose and made a perfectly flat bridge. I started to run after her, leaving Ashbel standing behind me still in a bit of a daze.

"Nora! Wait!" Ashbel called, finally catching up.

I turned around of a second. "Go and tell everyone! I'm going to try and catch her!"

"Nora!" Ash called again from behind me, but I was gone.

I ran over the bridge and up the hill. I saw her, she was heading towards the treeline of a dense forest, the trees either bare or almost there, disregarding the bucket as she made her way in. I pushed my legs as fast as they would go. I stayed right behind her the entire time, never losing sight of her. As we ran through the trees it started pouring rain, making the ground slick and muddy.

"Valerie! Please! Stop!" I called. "I know what you're going to do! Please!"

She stopped short, staring straight ahead for a minute before turning to face me. "You can't stop me! I know that I can pull it off!"

I stopped about 10 feet from her, for some reason. "No, you can't pull it off! Human transmutation is impossible! Look at what happened to Dad! And besides! Why would you try and do it anyway?! Just to get attention?! Well, you got everyone's attention now Valerie!"

"No! I need to prove to everyone that I'm better than you!" She cried. She looked at me, the same way she did after our argument, the day before she ran off, completely enraged.

"What, why!?"

She looked at me for a second, but said nothing. Then she turned and started running again.

"Valerie, stop!" I started after her again.

As I ran, I remember something Mom had said back when Valerie first vanished.

 _It was the day after Valerie went missing. We all sat down in the living room to talk._

" _Adam said that you and Valerie had an argument." I said to Mom._

 _Mom nodded. "Yes, we did."_

" _What was it about?" asked Dad._

 _Mom took a deep breath before speaking. "She had been sitting on the couch, reading," Mom started. "I asked her to help me clean up the kitchen, and she just looked at me and rolled her eyes. So I snapped at her. I told her that she needs to help around the house more, like Nora does." She looked at me._

" _Like me?" I asked. Knowing Valerie, that would have really set her off._

 _Mom nodded and continued. "She snapped back and said 'why should I be like her? All she ever does is take up all of Dad's attention, and stays in her room studying.'" Mom looked around the table at Dad, Adam and I for a second before moving on. "Then she really went off and said that she was better than Nora, better then everyone in the house. And that she was going to make everyone see how great she was. I snapped at her again and said that she could try as hard as she wanted but she... she would never be more... more then... a big brat..." Mom started crying after that._

" _Why?" She balled. "Why did I say something like that?"_

Valerie wanted to prove that she was better than me by trying human transmutation? No, she wanted to prove that she was better, then me, Dad, Al, Mustang, better and smarter than every alchemist in the world, by pulling off a successful human transmutation.

But, she would never prove that she was better, because if she goes though with the transmutation...

"Valerie! Please!" I called after her.

I tripped on a tree root, and landed in a puddle of mud. I looked up from the ground , and saw that Valerie was gone.

"Crap!" I snapped. Wincing, I stood up slowly. After making sure I hadn't twisted my ankle, I started running again.

I didn't really know where to go after I lost Valerie, so I just kept running in a straight line. Eventually I made it through all the tree into an open clearing. In the middle of the clearing was a old house. The house was covered in ivy vines, the windows were broken and the front door was open. Not the type of house you'd want to be in on a rain night after dark.

I ran up the house and quickly went inside. "Val! Valerie!" I called, but there was no answer.

I walked around the house a bit, seeing that this place was clearly where Valerie had been staying. The lighting in the house was dim, at best, there were a few candles that I could see on the floor, the wax melted so much that it had glued the candles down. Although I could tell that Val had been staying here the place still smelled musty, like an old attic that has been opened in ages. I walked through the mess that was made Valerie, before I saw another open door. From the outside, it looked like a pantry door, but when I opened it, it lead to a basement. I followed the concrete stairs as they curved slightly down, to the bottom, where there was a long, dark hallway, at the end of which I could see the faint light of candles. I walked down the hall with one hand on each wall until I got to the door at the other end, where I heard Valerie's voice.

"Crap!" I ran into the room. "Valerie!"

I was too late, she had started the transmutation. She was kneeling on the floor, with her hands on the transmutation circle. As she watched the transmutation, her eyes were filled with excitement. But then the light from the transmutation started to change.

'Crap, what can I do?' I thought rapidly. The only thing I could think of was to join in on the transmutation, maybe that way the toll on her wouldn't be too severe. I fell to my knees and put my hands on the circle, and the backlash for that was instant, some of the skin on my arms was ripped off. I groaned in pain.

Valerie finally noticed me. Worry and anger crossed her face. "What are you doing! Don't get involved!"

Before I could say anything back, Valerie screamed. I looked over to her and saw that the real rebound has started. It was crawling around on her stomach, which probably meant it was taking some of her organs.

"What is going on?" She shrieked. "He said this wouldn't happen if I did what he told me to do!"

"Valerie!" I went to move over to her, but suddenly I felt a sharp pain in my right leg. I looked down and saw that it had started working on my leg. I screamed in agony. I didn't know what to do. There was no way to stop a transmutation this big now. I just prayed that Ash, Dad and the others showed up soon, that was assuming that they could find us.

I looked back at where Valerie was, and saw that she had collapsed, probably from the pain. But from what I could tell, she was still breathing. I looked back at my leg, and now it was completely gone, but the little hands coming from the circle were still touching me. They had moved to my left arm and started working there. I let out another gut-wrenching scream. The pain was unbearable. I now understood what Dad and Al had meant when they said that the pain they felt was impossible to describe, there was no word for the amount of pain I was going though, it was just pure pain. But then suddenly, I had a hard time breathing. Was it working on my lungs now? If so, then I wasn't going to make it out of this alive. My vision slowly started to blur. I looked back at Valerie and saw that she had started to move. 'Good' I thought, 'at least she's make it out alive.' Then I blacked out.

When I opened my eyes, I was standing a white space. There was no walls, ceiling, or floor, it was just pure white. I looked around and saw this huge door behind me, with some writing on it but I couldn't make out what it said.

"Well, another child." said a voice.

I spun around and saw this… _thing_ standing there. It had no face, or any real body for that matter. The only reason I knew something was there was because it had a slight black outline around its figure. The only thing on its face was a wide smile.

"What are you?" I asked. Oddly, standing in front of this thing, I felt calm, but I couldn't explain why, it was like I felt at home.

" _I am the called by many names, I am the world, I am the universe, I am god, I am truth, I am all, I am one, and I am you._ " It said as it pointed at me. It's voice sounded as if many different people were speaking at the same time, but there was one voice that rained over them.

Suddenly I remembered something Dad had told me when I was little. The words that it just said to me was the exact same thing that 'Truth' said to Dad.

"What did I pay for my toll?" I asked. I knew that 'Truth' had taken my right leg and my left arm, but I didn't know if it took anything else.

'Truth' smiled. "Smart girl. You payed the price of your arm," my left arm vanished, "your leg," next my right leg was gone, "and your soul."

I froze. "My... _soul_?"

"Yes, that is why you are still here. Your soul was taken from you body. And unless someone is willing to pay the price for your soul, you will never leave here."

My mind was racing. My soul was taken? I didn't even think that was possible. And how would someone know that my soul was taken in the first place? From just looking at my body, it would probably just look like I bleed out, after all my arm and leg were taken.

"Oh," said 'Truth'. "Someone is here for you."

I snapped out of my reverie. "What? Who?"

'Truth' seemed to vaporize, and behind it stood Valerie. I was shocked to see her.

"Val, what are you doing here?"

"I'm getting your soul back, obviously." She rolled her eyes.

"But, at what price? What did you lose in the first place?" I asked, slightly panicked.

"I don't have the time to tell you," She said. " Are you here, 'Truth'?"

'Truth' reappeared. "Yes?"

"Take whatever you want from me, but give Nora her soul back."

"Valerie, wait-" I started, but Valerie put her hand up.

"You are trying to save someone who you share no blood with?"It laughed. "Very well then."

"Wait, what do you mean, ' _share no blood with_ '? We're sisters." I stated.

"Maybe, in bond yes, but not in blood." said 'Truth'. "Now go back to your body."

The doors behind me opened before I could register. The same small hands from earlier came out and started pulling me in. "Valerie!" I called.

She looked at me and waved, almost as if she was waving goodbye. "VALERIE!" I called as the doors closed.

I was pulled though this whirlpool of knowledge. It all went it into my head so fast, I felt like my head was going to explode. Suddenly, it all stopped, and I was back in the room from earlier.

I tried to move, then the pain hit me all at once. I started throwing up again. I caught a hold of myself and look around the room, and I saw Valerie on the floor next to me.

"Valerie," My voice croaked. I turned myself towards her, despite the pain. "Valerie." I said again, but there was no answer. I looked over her body to see what she was missing. She had both her legs and arms. As my eye scanned over her chest, I saw a huge pool of blood in the middle of her chest. And in the middle of that, there was a hole, right over where her heart should be. My eyes widened. The hole was the size of a fist, like someone reached inside Valerie's body and pulled her heart out.

I turned away from her and started heaving. My mind was dead. I couldn't comprehend it. Had the price for my soul been her heart? I couldn't believe that. No, I didn't want to believe it. I didn't want to believe any of this. I wanted all of this to be a bad dream—nightmare that any second I would wake up from.

Then upstairs, I heard voices, calling for me and Valerie. They finally came, but it was too late. I could hear someone coming down the stairs when I passed out from the pain.


	6. Chapter five

The rain had stopped outside, but the ground was still wet and slick. We had no idea where we were going, but we ran through the trees anyway.

"Ashbel!" I shouted behind me. "Are you sure they came this way?"

"Yes, Ed. I'm sure!" Ashbel called back.

Ash had come back from finding Nora to tell us that they had ran into Valerie, and that Nora set off after her. He had also told us about the theory that Nora had about what Valerie was planning to do.

I was panicking. I just couldn't understand why Valerie would do something like that. It didn't make any sense. Was she doing just to get attention like Nora said? If that was the case then this was going too far for it.

I tripped on a tree root, fell into a puddle of mud. "Crap!" I snapped.

"Ed, are you okay?"

I looked up and saw Al holding out his hand to help me up.

"Yeah, Al I'm fine." I brushed myself off. "We have to keep moving."

Finally we broke through the trees, and we found ourselves in a clearing. At the other end of the clearing was a old house that looked like it was about the collapse.

"They must be in there." Said Mustang.

I nodded, and as we started to run again we heard a blood curdling scream, and we froze. I couldn't tell with one of the girls it was, but either way I bolted to the house.

"Ed! Wait!" Al called.

But I didn't wait, and wasn't going to. I needed to see what happened. Had Valerie actually gone through with the transmutation? Was that Nora's scream? I had to know, and I wasn't going to wait for anyone to find out.

I ran into the house without really thinking. "Nora! Valerie!" I called.

I looked around the main floor. The house was empty of any real belongings, but the was a cot with a pillow and blankets, and some scraps of food. This must have been where Valerie had been staying.

Al and the others caught up, "Ed, can you-"

I started making my way to the back of the house, "Split up and look around." I said.

Mustang and Ashbel went upstairs, Al and I stayed on the main floor. I called for the girls as I walked around, hoping that one of them would hear me.

I was in what once was a kitchen when Al called, "Guy! Down here!"

I ran over to where I heard his voice, and I could hear Ash and Mustang coming down the stairs.

"What is it Al?" I called as looked around, "Where are you?"

"Down here!" He shouted again. "Quickly!"

I followed his voice and found a stairway leading down to what looked like a basement. I turned around to see Mustang and Ash behind me before running down the stairs.

At the bottom of the stairs was a hallway with a large room at the end. The room was dark, without few candles that were lit, we wouldn't have been able to see at all. I let my eyes adjust, and looked around. On the floor I could see what was left of a transmutation circle, and in the center of the circle was what looked like a pile of flesh and bones. I saw it and had a sudden flashback that made me want the hurl. But I caught a hold of myself and continued to look around.

Then I saw Al on the floor, "Al, where are they?" I asked.

He didn't answer.

My heart started to pound faster. I walked over to him. "Alphonse," I started, but stopped as I came up behind him. I hadn't noticed it before, but now I saw that Al was kneeling in a pool of blood. My heart stopped for a second and I almost fell to the floor. Al turned around, his hands were covered in blood, and the look on his face was horrified.

"Ed..." was all he could get out. He moved aside slight, as to let me see what was in front of him. I fell to me knees, in front of Al was Nora and Valerie. Nora was missing an arm and a leg, and Valerie was covered in blood.

"I stopped Nora's bleeding but I don't know how long it will hold." Al said after a minute. "But... there was nothing I could do for Valerie."

I looked at him and went to snap at him but the look on his face made me stop. I moved over to where Valerie was, and saw why Al couldn't have done anything for her. There was a hole going straight into her chest, right where her heart should have been. My eye were wide with horror, and my stomach was turning over repeatedly.

I just couldn't wrap my mind around this, and I didn't want to. This couldn't be real.

"Edward," I turned around, it was Mustang with Ashbel standing next to him. Nether of them said anything, but Ash pulled a pair of gloves out of his pocket.

"Can I?" Asked Ash. He looked horrified, and like he was about to keel over.

I moved over to let him to Nora. He kneeled next to her cautiously as he put the gloves on. "Hold her, just in case." Mustang noted. Al moved to Nora's shoulders and Ash held her leg. The bleeding had started slowly again. Ash snapped his fingers once and let a small spark go in the air, it hung there for a second before disappearing. I assumed it was for practice. Then Ash snapped his fingers again, this time lighting a low flame at the end of what was left of Nora's right leg. Nora moved and groaned slightly. We all froze.

"Nora?" I said in a low voice, "Can you hear me?"

She moaned again, but said nothing. Ashbel finished with her leg and moved over to her left shoulder. Nora continued to moan until Ash finished.

Al looked around the room, "Are there and bandages somewhere in here?" he asked. "We still have to wrap up Nora's wounds."

"I'll go and look around." said Mustang.

"I'll help." Ashbel added as he stood up. His pants were soaked with blood.

The two of them left, leaving me and Al alone with the girls. I looked back and forth between the two of them. Nora laying next to me, missing pieces of skin on her right arm all the way up to her neck, missing her left arm, her right leg, and barely breathing. And next to her was Valerie, covered in blood and with a hole in her chest.

I couldn't keep it in anymore, I turned away from them and just started heaving.

"Brother!" Al said, alarmed. He moved over next to me and put his and on my shoulder. I brought back up everything that I had eaten in the morning, even though it wasn't a lot, and after a minute I was just heaving on air. It took me a few moments to get control of myself.

"Are you okay, Ed?" asked Al.

"No," I answered. "I'm not."

Al didn't bother asking what was wrong, because he knew. This brought back a lot of bad memories for the both for us. Even after going through everything we went thought to put it behind us, our past transgressions had found a way to haunt us again.

"What am I supposed to tell Winry?" I asked. "How am I supposed to tell her about Valerie?"

Al didn't answer. Just then, Mustang and Ash came back. "This was all we could find, but we grabbed the blankets from upstairs just in case."

Ash went to place the thing on the floor but stopped when he saw the blood. "Right, I'll just hold it."

Al bound up Nora's wounds the best he could before standing up. "Okay, I think it's safe to move her now."

"Right, we should get back soon, it's gotten really late." agreed Mustang. There was a pause. "Ed?"

I looked away from Nora and Val. "Right, sorry." I turned to Ashbel, "Hey Ashbel can you unfold the blanket?"

He looked at me for a second then nodded. He went to hand it to me, "Just hold it like that for a second." I told him. I turned back to Nora, and carefully worked her into my arms. I stood up slowly and turned back to Ash, "blanket."

He held out his arms, "Don't worry," I told him, "I'll take her back." I slowly placed Nora in the blanket, wrapped her up and carefully took her back. I picked her up so the her left side was against my chest and that I was holding her leg.

"Okay, then." Said Mustang. "Are we ready to go?"

I paused for a second, "What about Valerie?"

No one said anything. It's not that we forget about her, it's just that none of us knew what to do.

"I'll stay behind and take her back with me later." Said Al.

"Are you sure, Al?" I asked.

"Yeah, there are some things around here that I want to take a look at here anyway. I won't stay too long."

I looked at him for a long second before nodding. "Okay then, we'll see you back at the house."

Al nodded. Mustang, Ashbel and I made our way out off the house. When we made it outside again we saw that the sun had completely set and now the sky was black.

"Crap," I muttered. "I can't see a thing." I looked up, searching for the moon but couldn't find it, it was ether a new moon or it was hiding behind some clouds.

"I've got it." Said Mustang.

I looked over to where I heard his voice. "Got what?" I asked.

But no sooner had I asked then he lit the end of a stick on fire. I looked at him with a raised eyebrow, but shrugged and said nothing. We walked back through the wood in silence, the only noise was the sounds of bugs and the wind.

It took us over an hour to get out of the wood and another thirty minutes to get back to the house. And in that whole time Nora didn't move or stir once. As we walked up the front porch, we heard someone running inside.

"Dad!" Adam swang the front door open. "Where's-" He started, but stopped when he looked at me.

I didn't wait for him to say anything. "Adam, can you let us in? Please?"

He stood frozen from a moment before moving. I went inside first, "Winry?" I called.

"Ed! You're back!" Winry came running into the room. "Where are the, girls?" She trailed off as she looked at our group, and her eyes stopped on me, more specifically my arms.

She put her hands over her mouth and fell to her knees. "Mom!" Adam when to her, "Are you okay?"

I handed Nora to Mustang, and turned to Adam. "Adam, can you take them to the operation room?"

He looked up at me then back at Winry. "Please, and get things ready for Mom." I told him.

He looked at me like I had three heads for some reason, but after a moment he stood up and took Mustang and Ash in the back. I walked over to Winry and kneeled down in front of her.

"Winry, are you okay?" I asked.

"No!" She snapped. "I am not okay! How can I be okay after see Nora like that! And how can you sound so damn calm!?" She looked at me with tears running down her face.

That struck me. I didn't realize it until she pointed it out, I did sound calm, too calm for a situation like this.

"I'm not calm," I told her. "I am far from calm. But right now, I have to act calm and collected. Because being anything other then calm wouldn't help anyone, especially Nora."

"Where's Valerie?"

My heart stopped for a second. I looked away from Winry's piercing eyes.

"Edward, Where is Valerie?" She asked again, but I still couldn't look at her, nor could I give her an answer.

"Edward!" She screeched. "Where is she!?"

I couldn't bring myself to say it, so I just shook my head and said, "I'm sorry." as I looked down at the floor.

She was silent for a minute before breaking out into sobs. I didn't know whether she thought that I meant we didn't find her or something else, but that didn't matter right now. I went to pull her into a hug but I was still covered in blood so I stopped, but then Winry wrapped her arms around me anyway.

We stayed like that for a few minutes before Adam walked in. "Everything's ready." he said in a shaky voice.

"Winry." I whispered.

"I know." She whispered back.

She stood up and walked over to Adam. "Would you mind helping me?" She asked.

Adam didn't answer right away. "I'm sorry but I can't." He said after a minute.

"That's okay. Thank you for getting everything ready." Winry said as she walked passed him. She turned back to me and said, "I'll let you know when I'm done. I shouldn't be too long."

I nodded. After she left I went up to Adam. "Are you going to be okay?"

He didn't say anything, he just went and sat on the couch. I sat across from him in a reclining chair. After a few minutes Mustang and Ashbel came out from the back, I opened my mouth to ask them how it was going, but Mustang waved me off, I raised an eyebrow, than I looked at Ash, his face still had a little bit of blood on it and his hands were shaking.

"Ash, maybe you should go upstairs and wash off." Mustang suggested. Ash looked at him for a minute, like he was trying to process what Mustang had just said. After a minute or two, Ash nodded and made his way upstairs. I looked over at Adam, his face had the same look of confusion as Ashbel's. Eventually Adam went upstairs as well, without saying a word.

I watched as Adam went up, then I turned to Mustang, "Did something happen in the back?" I asked.

He nodded. "Nora said something."

My eyes grew wide. "What? Did she wake up?" I asked frantically getting to my feet.

"Sit down, she didn't wake, it was more like she was sleep talking." Mustang told me.

I sat back down slowly. "Well? What did she say?"

"Are you sure you want to know?" He asked.

"Roy, just tell me." I was getting impatient.

He looked at me for a long moment, before sighing. "Fine, although, I'm going to say right now that I don't think you're going to like it." There was a long pause before he continued. "She said that it's all her fault. And..."

"And what? Come on Mustang, just tell me." I pressed.

"And that she kill Valerie. She stole her heart."

I looked at Mustang for a minute, not entirely hearing his words. But even when his words finally sunk in, I still didn't understand. After a few minutes I spoke. "What do you think she was talking about?"

"To be honest I don't really know," Mustang responded with a shrug." But Adam heard her say that and he froze."

I nodded. "That would explain why he was acting kind of strange. But what about Ashbel?"

Mustang just shook his head, "She said something else to him on our way back there, but I didn't hear it."

"I see." I would have to ask Ash about it in the morning. We sat there like that for about another twenty minutes, until Winry can back out. I stood up and walked over to her, she had a look on her face like she was ready to collapse. I put my arm around her waist and walked her over to the couch. Just as I sat Winry down, someone pounded on the front door.

Winry went to stand up again, but I pushed her back down. "I've got it."

I walked over to the door and opened it slowly. I sighed with relief when I saw it was Al. "Alphonse," I looked at his face, and saw he wasn't looking at me but what he was holding in his arms. I looked down for a split second then looked back at Al's face. I stood in front of him for a minute before deciding to move aside.

Winry cried when she saw Al. She got up and ran over to him, holding her arms out. Adam came running down the stairs to see what happened, and he stopped halfway down the stairs when he saw what Al was holding. Adam fell to his knees on the landing. Ashbel came down behind Adam slowly, but then turned around when he saw Al.

Al slowly placed Valerie in Winry's arms. Winry held Valerie, crying and fell to her knees. I went behind her and put my arms around them both. I couldn't help but cry with her, after this was our daughter, how could I not cry. Riza came down the stairs and stopped at the bottom for a minute before going over to where Roy was still seated.

After a little while, I stood up and held my arms out to Winry, "Can I take her?" I asked in a soft voice. She had stopped crying, and was just sitting on the floor holding Valerie. "Winry?"

She was silent for a minute, before answering. "What are you going to do?" she asked, her voice hoarse from the crying.

"I'm going to take her into the O.R. in the back, until we have everything else sorted out, okay?"

She just looked at Valerie for another minute before holding her out to me. I took Valerie carefully into my arms and walked to the back. Al went to Winry and moved her to the couch. I put Valerie on the operating table. I looked at her face for a minute, her eyes were closed, and she had a slight smile. Why was she smiling? I took her hand, it was cold and was covered in dry blood. I leaned over her and kissed her forehead. I squeezed her hand lightly. I left the lights on in the room as I closed the door just as a reminder, not that it was really needed.

I went back to the living room and saw that Winry wasn't there. Before I could ask where she went Riza came down the stairs and said, "Winry's in your room, she wanted to try and sleep."

I nodded, and saw that Adam was now sitting on the couch next to Al. I opened my mouth to say something, but stopped. I didn't know what to say, the only thing I could think to say was, "Adam, you should get some sleep too."

He looked at me for a second then nodded. "By the way," He said as he went up the stairs. "Nora is in Ashbel's room down here."

"Thank you for telling me." I said with a small smile. He nodded and continued up the stairs.

Everyone else slowly went to their rooms, leaving me on the couch. Eventually I stood up, I thought about going upstairs, but I didn't want to wake Winry by getting in the bed. So instead, I went down the hall to where Nora was. I stood in the doorway for a moment before turning the light on. Nora was on the bed, and if I didn't know better I would say that she was just sleeping. I watched her for a minute before turning off the big light and just leaving the lamp light on. I sat in a reclining chair by the window. I sat there just watching Nora, until I fell asleep, thinking that maybe when I woke up I would find that this whole thing was just a bad dream.

Unfortunately, it wasn't...


	7. Chapter six

"How much longer do you think until she wakes up?" Said a faint voice. I couldn't really tell who it was that was speaking because the voice was gabbled.

"I don't know, but it should be soon." said another.

The voices faded in and out. And when I couldn't hear them, I relieved what had happened to me and to Valerie. But what I remember the most are the words that 'Truth' had said to Valerie right before I woke up again in the room, "You are trying to save someone who you share no blood with? Very well then." Those words repeated over and over again.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the black void in my mind started to fade. The voices became clearer, and now I could recognize them. I could hear Dad talking to Roy and Riza about something. And in the background I heard Adam talking to who sounded like Mai. Then, slowly I forced my eyes open. The light a first was blinding, and it took a minute for my eyes to adjust. Once I could see clearly, I looked around. The first thing I noticed was that I wasn't in my room, instead I was in a room on the ground floor. I looked out the window, and saw that it was late afternoon, the sky was starting to change from a bright blue, to a slight pink.

After I took in my surroundings, I went to try and sit up in the bed, but stopped when I felt a sharp pain in my left shoulder and right hip. I fell back on the bed and moaned from the pain. I started to roll onto my left side with the intention of pushing up with my arm and thought the pain, but stopped when I remembered. I rolled on my back again and first lifted my right leg. The blanket lifted a little past my waist, then I slowly put it back down. I touched my left shoulder and flinched. _They were gone, just gone..._ I thought, my heart pounding against my chest. _It all really happened._ I covered my face with my remaining hand, fighting back tears.

It took me a moment to find a way to sit up with little pain. As I finally managed to sit up right, Dad walked in. "Nora! You're awake!" He said startled.

"Hi." I waved weakly.

Mom came up behind Dad, probably because she heard him say that I was awake. "Nora! Thank god! You're finally awake!" Mom ran up to me and hugged me.

The pain from her contact hit hard. I moaned. "Um, Mom, shoulder."

"Oh right, sorry." She let go quickly. "I just glad that you're awake."

"How long have I been out?" I asked.

"Three days." Dad answered.

"What? Really? Wow, I'm sorry if I made you guys worry."

"It's fine, we're just glad that you're okay." Mom said, smiling widely.

Dad slipped out to tell everyone that I woke, and they slowly came to see me. Soon enough everyone was standing in my room, saying that they were happy that I was okay. I found out that Mai had come two days ago, the day after the incident, and Ashbel had gone back to Southern Headquarters this morning.

As everyone talked, I noticed Adam standing at the doorway, like he didn't really want to be there. "Hey, Adam." I said.

His head shot up and he looked at me for a second with wide eyes before looking away. "Hi." was all he said.

I watched him for a minute before remembering something. "Hey Dad?"

"Yeah?"

"How did you find us? Me and Val, I mean." I asked.

Everyone in the room exchanged wary glance, then Mom spoke. "How about I make you something to eat Nora? What would you like?"

I looked over to her, "Um, I just have some soup."

"Perfect. I'll go and get that for you." Mom said, then left the room. Mai and Riza followed her out, and Adam shortly after that, leaving me, Dad, Roy and Al in the room.

I looked at who was left, "Okay... what happened?" I asked, as my stomach started to slowly knot.

Dad looked at me for a long minute before asking, "Do you remember what happened to you?"

"Yes." I answered with a short quick nod.

"What?" Al spoke. He looked surprised that I had answered so quickly. "Really? Ar-are you sure?"

I nodded again. "Yes, I remember every little detail."

They all looked a bit surprised, like they were expecting me not to remember a thing. Roy was the next one to speak. "What happened when you found Valerie at the house?"

I thought for a minute. "I found her in the basement of the house, and when I went down there she had already started the transmutation."

"Wait," Said Al, sounding confused. "If she had started it without you getting involved then how did you..." He trailed off.

I nodded, understanding where he was going. "I jumped in before it got really bad. As a result," I held out my right arm, which was wrapped in bandages. "The rebound from jumping in like that cause some of my skin to be ripped off."

They collective nodded, as if they could picture it in their heads.

"Nora," Dad looked at me, his tired eyes had a trace of worry in them. "Did you scream?"

I looked at him for a second, eyebrows furrowed. "What do you mean?"

"After the transmutation, did you scream?" He repeated.

I searched my mind for a moment. "No, I was in too much pain to let out a decent scream. Why?"

"Because,"Al interjected. "when we got to the clearing where the house was, we heard someone let out a..." He paused, as if looking for the right words. "ear-splitting scream."

"Then it definitely wasn't me." I thought for a moment."That must have been Valerie when she..." I trailed off. _When she found my soul was missing..._

"When she what?" Asked Roy.

I didn't answer at first. I reached my hand behind my neck, and at the base of it I felt something like a rash. And when I touched it, I had a sudden flash of 'Truth'. I dropped my hand automatically.

"Nora?" Dad looked at me. He seemed

"Oh. Sorry, I zoned out."

"It's okay, but what were you saying about why Valerie screamed?"

Dad seemed to really want to know the answer. But I couldn't find it in me to tell him the truth. "She must have been screaming from the pain." was the answer I gave.

"I see..." said Dad. He seemed almost relieved, like he had thought it was for a different reason.

We all were silent for a moment. I opened my mouth to ask a question, then bit down on my lip, thinking better of it.

"Oh, just get it out already!" someone snapped.

I looked around the room, a bit confused, then Adam walked in, and he look angry about something.

"Adam, wait a-" Al started to say, but Adam cut him off.

"Why won't you just come out and say it to her." He said, looking around. "Just ask the damn question already!"

"Adam, stop." Dad looked at him in such a way that normally Adam would do whatever he said, but now Adam just ignored him

"Fine, if you're not going to ask her then I will." He looked straight at me. "Nora,"

"Yeah?"

"Adam, wait a sec-!" Dad snapped, but Adam continued.

"Did you kill Valerie?" He stared at me, ignoring everyone else.

At first, I didn't really understand what he had just asked me. And I guess the look on my face gave that away, so Adam repeated the question. After realizing what he meant, my stomach knotted. What made him think that? How did he know?

"Wha-what do you mean by that Adam?" I asked in a shaky voice.

He looked at me with a stone cold expression. "After Dad and the others brought you back, the General, Ash and I took you in the back operating room and on the way back you said something."

"I did?" I asked. I looked around the room for conformation, Dad and Al didn't react but Roy nodded.

"And do you know what you said?" Adam asked, with tears rolling down his face. "You said that it was all your fault and that you killed Valerie!"

I looked at Adam as his tears continued to fall. Had I really said that? I didn't know what to say or how to respond. I knew perfectly what I had meant, I was the reason that Valerie did what she did, and in order to rebound my soul to my body she traded her heart, so in some respect I had killed her. But I couldn't say that. I didn't want to let anyone know what had happened in that house, so I couldn't give Adam the truth.

"Well!" Adam yelled. "What did you mean by that!?"

"Adam, I-" I started to answer him, but then Mom walked in, holding a tray with a bowl of soup.

"I think that's enough questions for now. Let's give Nora some space."

Adam looked at Mom, with tears still rolling then turned and walked out of the room. I could hear him stomp up the stairs and slam his door. Mom turns and looks at the other still in the room, which caused Al and Roy to stand up and leave. Dad was the only one who didn't move, he was just looking at me.

"Edward." Mom said looking at him. But still he didn't move or break his stare.

"Dad, are you okay?" I asked. I didn't like the way he was looking at me, it made me feel as if he knew something that I didn't.

Still, he said nothing. Mom placed the tray on the side table next to me before walking over to him and placing a hand on his shoulder. "Ed-" she started, but then finally Dad stood up.

"Sorry, I was just thinking. I'll leaving you alone now." Then he left.

Mom and I watched Dad leave and close the door. Mom shrugged before turning back to me. "Here." She placed the tray next to me. "Do you want me to help you?"

I looked at the tray, "No I think I can do it." I said as i reached for the spoon. Mom moved the tray a little closer to me. I slowly sipped on the soup, and made my way though about half of it before I felt full.

After I was done, Mom moved the tray and started to work on changing my bandages. We sat there in silence as she started to unwrap my torso and my arm.

"Hey Mom?"

"Yes Nora?"

"What... have you decided to do about Valerie?"

Her hands stopped moving for a moment, then as she continued she said, "We're burying her tomorrow."

"Oh..."

There was another long, painfully loud, silence. I didn't know what to say, although there was a lot hanging in the air. I couldn't even begin to imagine what Mom must be feeling like right now. And I noticed when she came in that she was tired, she had dark circles under her eyes and she looked a little pale. She obviously had been worried about me, and at the same time she had deal with understanding what happened to Valerie. And on top of that, take care of the normal things around the house.

I desperately want to say something, but I could think of anything to say that won't make the already awkward silence worse. I couldn't take it any more, I started to break out into sobs and I couldn't stop them.

Mom stopped what she was doing at looked up at me. "Nora! What's wrong? Are you in pain?"

I covered my face with my hand and shook my head. I tried to stop the tears but they just kept falling.

"Then what's wrong dear?"

"I'm-" I tried to speak between the sobs.

"What?" Mom tried to get me to look her in the eyes.

"I'm sorry!" I screeched. "I'm so sorry Mommy."

"Oh, Nora!" Mom pulled my head against her chest and held me.

"I'm sorry Mommy." I just repeated those words. The last time I had said 'Mommy' was when I was about 7 years old.

We sat there like that for a few minutes until finally I could control the sobs. Mom lifted my face so that I was forced to look her in the eye.

"Nora." She said calmly. "I want you to understand something. Okay?"

I nodded.

"No one blames you for what happened." She emphasize her words carefully.

"But-" I started.

"And." Mom continued. "It's not your fault. Remember that."

I looked into her eyes for a minute before nodding.

"Okay then." She said with a small smile. "Now, let's finish with your bandages, okay?"

I nodded again, wiping my eyes. After Mom finished with my torso, she changed the bandages on my leg. She was getting ready to leave to throw the old ones, when I stopped her.

"Hey Mom?"

"Yes?"

"Can you bring Dad's pocket watch? It should be on my side table in my room."

"Sure honey, just give me a minute."

I nodded as she walked away. I led back down on the bed and stared at the ceiling. After a few Mom came back with the box. She opened the box for me and handed me the watch. I held it for a moment before opening it. The watch had stopped, the hands on 6:30.

"Oh, it stopped working again? I can fix it." Mom said putting her hand out for it.

"No it's fine. Hey Mom, do you know what that date means?" I asked.

She looked at lid of the watch where it said 'Don't forget 3 Oct. 11'. "Oh that. That was the date when your father and Al burned down their house." She answered.

I nodded. "What's today's date?"

"Um, October 6th." Mom paused, then gasped. "Then that means..."

"The date of the incident was October 3rd..." I finished her sentence.

We looked at each other for a long moment, before Dad called for Mom. Mom stood up, "Do you need anything right now Nora?"

"No, I'm good."

"Do you want me to take that?" Mom pointed at the watch.

"No, I want to hold onto it for a little longer." I replied.

Mom nodded then left. I continued to hold the watch, I flipped it over in my hand a few times before putting back in the box. I laughed a little, _'It seems the watch made the decision for me.'_ I thought.

I flopped back on the bed, and turned my face to the window. "I'm going to become a State Alchemist, and I'm going to find out what Valerie and what 'Truth' meant."


	8. Chapter seven

After Valerie's funeral the next day, everyone returned to the house for lunch. But I had asked to stay behind for a few minutes. I stayed there with Dad and Al. No one said anything, we just stood, or in my case sat, there.

After about five minutes Dad spoke. "Nora, you know it's-" He started.

"It's not my fault, I know." I finished the sentience for him. Even as I said it, I didn't believe that. It was my fault, and nothing anyone else said would make me change my mind on that. I may not have given her the idea for the transmutation, but I was the reason that she lost her heart, and I would never forget that.

"Let's go, Winry is probably getting worried." Al suggested.

"Yeah, we can go now." I said.

Dad steered my wheelchair down the hill and Al followed. We got back to the house just as lunch was being served. It was just some sandwiches and an apple pie that Mom made. Roy was telling the story about the first time he faced a homunculus named Lust. I rolled my eyes, and I when looked over I saw Dad do the same. Mom handed me a slice of pie and went to sit down next to Adam, who still wouldn't talk to me. We all sat in the living room listening Roy, Dad and Al tell stories until about dinner time.

Once dinner was served, however, everyone was quite. We just sat in silence as we ate. The lack of conversation was killing me but I didn't know what to say that wasn't awkward.

"Okay can someone please say something?" Adam spoke abruptly. "I think the silence is going to kill me."

I sighed slightly. "Then go on Adam. You seem to have a lot to say."

He looked over at me with a blank expression. "Okay then, Nora, you never answered my question for yesterday." He stated bluntly.

"Oh? I didn't? I thought I gave you an answer." I told him back, and I purposefully let the sarcasm drip in my voice, although I knew that I really hadn't given him an answer.

"Guys, can we please not do this now?" Dad asked but Adam and I ignored him.

"No, you never gave me an answer." Adam spat.

"I'm pretty sure I did, maybe you just weren't listening." I replied.

"Guys." Dad tried again, but we continued.

"Then why don't you just say it again." Adam said angrily.

"Okay then, no." I told him.

"No what?" Adam said with sarcasm.

"My answer to your question is no."

"I don't believe you."

"I don't care if you believe me or not, but that's my answer." I said before looking to Mom. "Hey Mom, I'm done, can I be excused?"

Mom looked at me startled for a second. "Oh, yeah sure. I'll take you to your room." Then she started to stand up.

"I'll do it Winry." Said Riza, standing up first.

"Thank you Riza." Mom said, as she sat back down.

"No! We're not done talking!" Snapped Adam.

"Yes, we are. I gave you my answer." I replied to Adam as Riza pulled me away from the table. "Thank you." I told her.

"No!" Adam stood up abruptly, and slammed his hands on the table. "No, we are not done with this!"

"Adam! Enough!" Dad's voiced boomed.

Everyone froze. Dad had both hands clenched into fists on the table. He looked from Adam to me, then said. "This conversation is over. Nora, you're excused."

I was still frozen for a moment before nodding and looking at Riza. It took her a moment to move as well. We were quiet as we worked our way to my room. Once there, Riza helped me into my bed.

"Um... Riza?"

"Yes?"

"I have a question, and I want you to give me an honest answer, okay?"

She nodded. "What is it Nora?"

"This is just hypothetical. Let's say that you got into a dangerous situation, and you barely make it out with your life, and Roy wasn't here to see what happened." I paused for a second.

"You want to know what I would do?" Riza asked.

"No, not that, but... if something happened during that, something that you didn't want Roy or anyone else to know, would you still tell him about it, or would you keep it to yourself?" I finished. I looked into Riza's brown eyes, hoping that she could help me.

"I would tell him." She answered quickly.

I looked at her, surprised. "No matter what it was?"

"I would tell him every little detail that happened. Even if I didn't want him to know, I would still tell him."

I looked at her for a long moment, trying to understand. Then looked away.

"Is there something you haven't told us about what happened to you and Valerie?" Riza asked.

I looked up abruptly. "What? No, I just-" I started.

"It's okay, I'm not asking you to tell me." She said before I could finish. I sighed in relief, then she continued. "But I do think you should tell somebody. Maybe not know, but eventually."

I thought about it for a moment before nodding. "Okay."

"Good," She said with a smile. "I'm going to go back to the table, are you good?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Thank you."

"No problem, just call if you need anything." She said before leaving the room.

After Riza closed the door behind her, I laid back in the bed and stared at the ceiling, which had become my new favorite pass time, and thought about what Riza had said. She said that she would have willing told Roy anything that happened, but I couldn't do that. If I told everyone the truth, among other things, Dad, Al and Roy would freak out, and Adam would never forgive me. Although, if I was being honest with myself, I didn't really know how anyone would react. I just knew that it wouldn't end well.

The rest of the evening was quiet. After everyone was done eating and dinner was all cleaned up, Mom came in to change my bandages.

"Hey Mom?" I said as she was working.

"Yes?"

"How long would I have to wait until I could get automail?"

"Um, I'd say about another month, just to be safe."

"Do you think I could do it the way Dad did it? Do both at once and do a year's rehab?"

Mom finished with the bandages. "Maybe. Doing that might not be as hard on you since you're older then Ed was at the time. Why are you asking?"

"I want to get up and moving as soon as possible." I told her.

"Nora, there's no rush for you to get moving again. You could take your time and-"

"No, I just... never mind, we can talk about it tomorrow, okay?"

Mom looked at me worriedly, then nodded. "Okay."

As Mom left, she turned off the light, and shortly after I fell asleep.

I was running down a long and dark hallway, not knowing where I was going. As I ran I called for Valerie, over and over again. I need to stop whatever she had planned. Then somewhere at the end of the hall there was a bright yellow-ish light.

"Valerie!" I called. I ran as fast as I could down the hall, but it wasn't fast enough. By the time I got to the room Valerie was in, the transmutation was already under way. Before I had any real time to react, the light of the transmutation started to change.

"No!" I yelled. I threw myself on the floor and put my hands on the circle. Just as I did, Valerie screamed. I looked over and suddenly she was next to me covered in blood. I went to move over to her, but was stopped when I felt as if someone grabbed the collar of my shirt and pulled me back. Next thing I knew I was standing in front of 'Truth'.

"This is what happened when you save someone you have no blood with." It said.

Before I could understand what it meant, I was thrown back to Valerie. But instead of being next to her like I was before, I was standing over her and my body. As I tried to process the scene in front of me, I could hear someone calling our names. It was Dad and the others, they had found us.

I looked back down at Valerie and I, but when I did, we were both gone. I looked around, and saw that I was now standing in a dark abyss. I called out for Valerie, Dad, for anyone, but no one answered. Then suddenly, as I turned around, a decayed Valerie jumped at me. I opened my mouth to scream but no sound came out.

She wrapped her bony arms around me as whispered in my ear, "Why couldn't you stop me?" She hissed.

I woke up screaming at the top of my lungs. Because of my panic I tried to sit up, but half way up I fell back against the bed, gasping from the pain.

Suddenly Dad came through the door. "Nora!"

I looked over to him to say something, but felt myself gag instead. Dad quickly grabbed the small pail by the desk. He put it at the edge of the bed, I rolled slightly over to it and heaved. After a few moments, I regained control of myself.

"Nora what happened? I heard you scream from upstairs." Dad said, his voice full of worry.

Before I had a chance to answer, Mom came in. "Is everything alright?" She asked, frantic.

"I'm, okay." I said, gasping between words. "It was, just a, nightmare."

Mom and Dad exchanged a wary glance. "Are you sure you're okay? Do you want one of us to stay in here with you?" Mom asked.

"No, I'm fine."

"Nora, you don't have to-" Dad started.

"I'm fine." I said again.

They gave up and just nodded. I tried to go back to sleep after they left, but found that I couldn't. So I ended up staying awake until the sun came up. When Mom came to get me for breakfast she asked how I slept, I told her "Fine."

As Mom served me some food, Riza and Roy came down the stairs with their bags in hand.

"You guys are leaving?" I asked.

"Yeah, we have to get back to Central, we've been away a little too long." Roy said as he helped Riza with her bags.

"You can't even stay for some breakfast?" Mom asked as she poured me a glass of milk.

"No, sorry Winry, we have to get on the first train out." Riza replied.

"Okay then, safe trip." I said as I tried to put a spoonful of fruit in my mouth. "And if you get to talk to Ash, tell him I said hi."

"Okay, we'll see you later." Riza said as they both walked out the door.

After the Mustangs left, breakfast was quite. Adam didn't come downstairs, so it was just me, Mom and Dad.

"Nora," Mom started.

I looked up at her with some fruit in my mouth. "Hm?"

"Can we talk about what you were saying last night? When you were asking about getting automail."

I swallowed. "Oh, that."

"Wait, when did you have that conversation?" Asked Dad.

"When Mom changed my bandages last night before everyone went to sleep." I told him. To be honest, I was surprised Mom remembered.

"I want to know why you want to get automail so soon after everything that's happened." said Mom.

I thought about my answer carefully, trying to pick the right words to say. "I want to be a state alchemist, like we had planned." I said after a minute.

Mom and Dad looked at each other. "Nora, we said that you could take the test when you were 18, you still have two years." Dad noted.

"I know, I figure that I could do rehab in one year, then train for the other."

"I still want to know why so soon?" Mom asked.

"I know that, this may seem a bit, premature, but I need to have something to work towards. I need to be able to stand on my own legs and move forward." I looked between the two of them as I spoke, knowing that they would understand what I was saying.

"Nora look at me." Dad said with a certain amount of conviction.

I turned to Dad and looked straight into his golden eyes. I stared at Dad for a few minutes like that, and doing so reminded me of when I first asked him to teach me about alchemy. How he kneeled down to my eye level and stared at me for a moment before giving in and saying yes.

And in the same way Dad did back then, he sighed then said "Okay, if that's what you want."

Mom didn't seem very fond of that fact that Dad said yes, but agreed either way. "Okay then. We'll have to start planning, but I think for right now we can plan to do the surgery next month, and we'll do both at the same time, yes?"

"Sounds like a plan to me." Said Dad.

"Yup, same here." I agreed. "So starting next month, I'm going to start getting ready to become a state alchemist."


	9. Chapter eight

After a month of preparing, I was finally able to have the automail surgery. The surgery was excruciating, just like Dad had said, but after about a week I could deal with the pain. Mom tried to get me to take some pain meds, but I just kept saying no. One day Mom asked me why.

"This pain is nothing." I told her.

"What does that mean? You keep saying that, but what does that mean?" Mom said as she worked on my new leg.

"Its nothing compared to the pain she felt with what was taken."

Mom was silent, knowing that I was talking about Valerie, and after that she never asked again.

The first few months of rehab were hard, the getting used to my new arm and leg. I had to relearn to walk, and use my left hand, thankfully I am a righty so I didn't have to relearn to write. But after I made it passed a certain point it got easier. Moving started to not hurt as much and I could apply more weight to my leg.

By the time a year passed I was sparring with Dad and Al, both at the same time. At the end of the fight, both Dad and Al were out of breath and I was still standing. Dad was amazed at how well I was doing, but at the same time I could tell he was also worried, about what I did not know and he never said anything to me.

The next step was to go off and train. One night over dinner I brought it up.

"So, now that I've finished rehab and everything, I want to talk about going off to train." I said as I passed Dad a large bowl of pasta.

"What do you need to train for?" Asked Mom.

"Combat, plus I need to brush up on my alchemy. I haven't even looked at a book in over a year."

"Why combat? Sure, I understand needing to restudy alchemy a little, but you can do that here. You don't need to know combat to become a state alchemist." Said Dad as he took a sip of water.

"Actually," Al interjected. "Knowing some form of combat is now one of the new requirements to be able to go out in the field. Otherwise they consider you a researcher."

"Really? When did you hear that Al?" Asked Dad.

"I heard about it that last time I was in Central."

"Yeah, and I called General Mustang the other day and asked him about the requirements, just to make sure and he said the same thing." I added.

Dad looked at me with a raised eyebrow. "'General'? Since when do you address Mustang with his rank? Normally you just call him Roy."

I bit my lip. "Yeah, well I thought that maybe I should start getting in the habit of calling him General, just in case I end up working under him or something."

Dad looked at me sideways for another moment before shrugging. "Anyway, so now you have to know combat. What type were you looking to train in Nora?"

"Any type of weapon. Sword ,ax, mace, you know." I said.

Mom, Dad and Al all turned to me with wide eyes. I looked back at them. "What?"

Mom opened her mouth to respond but Adam spoke. "Why should anyone let you near weapons, you already know how to kill people with your bare hands."

My head snapped in his direction. This was the first time I had heard him spoke to me in months. Granted, it was always some rude comment, but usually he said it behind my back when I was leaving a room, not when I was sitting in front of him.

"Adam." Dad started in a stern tone.

Adam put his hands up in defense. "Sorry, Dad."

Dad sighed, then turned back to me. "Why weapons? Being a state alchemist you'll technically be a weapon."

"And plus, now that you've opened the gate..." Al cut in, but trailed off.

"I don't want that to be open knowledge." I stated quickly. "I think knowing weapons alchemy can hide that fact. Although, I don't know what to tell everyone about my automail."

"Okay, I can understand that. But still weapons?" Mom chimed in.

I shrugged. "I've always been fascinated with weapons, likes swords and bows and arrows, and other stuff like that. I don't really know why, maybe its from all the fantasy novels I used to read. But still I think that it would be cool."

"Have you looked into where you would have to go for weapons training?" Dad asked.

"I asked Havoc to look into it." I said. "The last time I spoke with him, he said that there was a guy just outside of East City that the state sometimes went to for weapons training and he a blacksmith, I forget what his name is..."

Dad looked at me with another raised eyebrow. "How often do you call into Central?" He asked.

I thought for a minute. "Um, every other day or so."

Dad opened his mouth to say something, but thought better of it. Then Mom spoke. "So, have you talked to this man about training you?"

"I haven't been able to get in touch with him, although Havoc did give me his number. He said that when I do get to talk to him I should tell him that I'm a personal friend to the Mustangs and that he wouldn't be able to say no." I said with a sly smile.

Dad sighed. "I'll call Havoc and ask him if we can get a face to face."

I nodded, and after that we resumed our quiet dinner.

It was a few weeks before we got the call back that we could meet the instructor, but there was one condition that Dad wasn't too happy about.

"He wants to know everything?" Dad said, a bit angry, a bit confused.

"Yes, everything. He wants to know why you want to learn how to fight with weapons, and basically know everything about you up until this point." General Mustang replied with a sigh.

Dad had taken me with him when he was called in to do some work in East City, and so that we could get a little more information from General Mustang while he was there.

"But, we can't. You told us not to tell anyone about the incident, unless they had to know for whatever reason. You even said to find a way to explain my automail at the time of my exam." I noted.

"Yes, well this is one of those times where a person has to know. He won't train you otherwise."

"Well, then why don't we just lie to him?" Dad asked. "We're to have to start coming up with something eventually."

"Normally, I would agree with you." Said Mustang. "But this man has an uncanny to tell if someone is lying. You could come up with the most convincing lie that everyone else believes, but he will know that you're lying."

Dad sighed and shifted in his set. "Well then, what are we supposed to do?"

"We tell him." I said.

They both looked at me. "Are you sure Nora? I mean are you comfortable with telling someone you don't know?" Asked Dad.

"No, not really. But I want this, and if getting this means telling a complete stranger everything that's happened, then I'll do it,"

Dad looked at me, and I could clearly that he was worried. It was the same look of worry that I had seen on his face for the past year. I turned away from him and to Mustang.

"So, when do we get to meet him?" I asked.

"Tomorrow."

I nodded. We then agreed on the time we should meet. After ironing out the details, I left to go back to the hotel, Dad had to stay to do some work.

We both watched Nora leave.

"Okay Fullmetal, what is it?" Mustang asked.

I said nothing. I looked at my watch, 'It should take Nora about 15 minutes to walk back to the hotel.' I thought.

"Ed, I don't really have time for this." Mustang said with a sigh. "So just say what's on your mind already."

"Do you know why she's so determined to do this? To be a state alchemist?" I asked.

Mustang raised an eyebrow. "Maybe it's because she's stubborn like her father."

I looked over to him. "Me? or her real father?" I asked.

Mustang leaned forward on his desk. "You, Ed. Not him. He's not her father, he didn't raise her. He experimented and tortured her when she was just a baby. He doesn't deserve to be called her father."

"I still haven't told her. About him I mean."

"What? Why not?"

"The time was never right for it." I shrugged. "With everything that's happened in the past year, I just didn't want to give her more to stress about."

Mustang shook his head. "What am I going to do with you." He said with a sigh.

"That's why I'm worried. About all this."

"What do you mean?"

"I heard her say once that she was doing this to find some answers that she was looking for. I don't really know what she was talking about but I don't want her to-" I was cut off.

"Find out who she really is? You don't even want to tell her the truth!" Mustang snapped.

"You said yourself that he doesn't even deserve to be called her father! If that's the case then why does she have to know about him?!" I snapped back.

Mustang sighed. "That's my opinion about him. Actually, I think it's fair to say that's everyone's opinion about him. But she doesn't even know who _he_ is. Let her come to her own conclusion."

"You sound like Winry." I said, sitting down on the couch.

"She's right, and I think you know that."

I didn't respond. He was right,(not that I would say that aloud,) I did know that. But at the same time, I felt like her knowing would change everything about her. Her personality, the way she acted towards me and Winry, and Adam, just everything. It would definitely change the way she looked at what happened with Valerie. And I didn't want that. I could see that she was still blaming herself for what happened, and I knew that no matter how many times we said the it wasn't her fault, she still thought that it was. But knowing that Valerie wasn't really her blood sister... I wasn't ready to see that change in her.

"I should get going, I do have things to do while I'm here in East City." I said, standing up.

"You make it sound like I was the one keeping you." Mustang said.

Just then Riza walked in, "Sorry to bother you sir, hi Ed, but your next meeting is in ten minutes."

"I'll see you tomorrow Mustang." I called as I walked out.

"See you tomorrow Fullmetal." Mustang called back.

I turned around. "Are you ever going to stop calling me that?" I asked.

"Nope." He replied with a sly smile.

I rolled my eyes then left.

I got back to the hotel, super tired from the walking. I was ready to go up to my room and fall asleep when I was called over by the desk clerk.

"Yes?" I said tiredly.

"You have a call Ms. Elric."

I raised an eyebrow. "From who?"

"Lieutenant Colonel Ashbel Mustang." said the clerk as he handed me the phone.

"Ash?" I took the phone and put it up to my ear. "Hello?"

"Hey Nora, how are you doing?" The voice on the other end of the phone was Ash.

"I'm fine Ash, what's up? And how did you know I was in East City?" I said as I waved off the clerk.

"I called your house first and your mom said the you were in East City with Ed." Ash replied.

"Okay... What do you need Ash? Did you want to talk to my Dad or something?"

"Nope, I wanted to talk to you."

"Me?" I was surprised. I had tried to talk to Ash after the incident, but every time I called his office, one of his underlings answered the phone and said that he was busy. I had even called the place he was staying a few times, but he never took the call.

"Why do you want to talk to me?" I asked.

"Just to catch up a little. I haven't talked to you in a while."

"Try a year." I said back, a bit annoyed. "What do you really want?"

The was a silence on the other end. After a minute Ashbel spoke again. "I want you to rethink becoming a state alchemist." He said bluntly.

"What?" That took me off guard. "Why do you care if I become a state alchemist?"

"Nora, just listen to me. Being a dog of the state isn't something someone in your position should do. Have you even began to think about what you're going to say about your automail?"

Now that I had recovered from the initial shock of what Ash had said, I was ready to stand my ground. "I have another year to figure that out." I told him. "And what I do with my life is my business. If I want to be a state alchemist then I'm going to be a state alchemist. I don't need you to go all 'big brother' on me and tell me what to do. We haven't talked in over a year, and that's because you were avoiding me."

"What? No I wasn't-" He started.

I cut him off. "Yes you were avoiding me. So don't try and tell me what to do, because when I needed your advice, or your opinion, hell even when I just wanted to talk to you, you weren't there. So, thanks for your concern but I will become a state alchemist. Now I have to go, I've had a long day and I'm tired. Goodbye Ashbel." I hung up the phone.

I saw the clerk looking at me from the other end of the desk. I glared at him, then went up to my room.

I was super tired but couldn't sleep. I was nervous and excited about the meeting. And on top of that I was pissed off at Ash. I didn't care what his reasons were, he didn't even try to talk to me when I needed him.

I ended up taking a shower instead of trying to fall asleep pissed. I let the water run until it was hot. I wanted to take a long shower but I couldn't do that with the automail, or at least I wasn't suppose to. I stood under the water for a few minutes just letting it run over me. After that I washed my hair and body. As I was washing my chest, I reached around to the back of my neck, I had an itch right in between my shoulder blades. I moved my hand to where the itch was, and the second I lightly touched it I was pulled back into that white space where I saw 'Truth' standing in front of me.

"You are truly a very foolish child. You don't even know who you really are." It said.

In the same amount it took me to get there, I was back in the shower. I took me a second to realize that I was on the floor of the shower. I looked around for something to grab and saw that the water was running red. I put my hand to the back of my head and when I pulled it away, there was blood on it. "Crap." I muttered. I moved to stand up and as I did, I saw small red flashes and heard something like a crackling sound. I looked around for the source but didn't see it. I was almost on my feet again when I landed back on the floor.

"Nora? Are you okay?" It was Dad, he probably heard me fall.

I opened my mouth to say something but instead of my voice coming out, no sound followed. I cleared my throat, "I'm fine Dad, I just slipped. Twice."

"Do you need any help?" He asked.

"No, I'll be out in a second."

I got back on my feet and finished up in the shower. I came out into the room, wrapped up in a robe, and saw Dad sitting on my bed. "Hey Dad."

"Hey, are you okay?" He asked.

"Yeah I'm fine. Can you do me a favor though? Can you check to see if I have a cut on my head?" I asked.

"Sure, why?" He patted the spot next to him.

"I think I hit my head when I fell and I just want to make sure that its not bleeding."

Dad moved his fingers slowly through my hair. "I'm not seeing anything."

"You sure?"

"Yeah, there's nothing there."

"Okay thanks." I said standing up from the bed.

"Your hair has gotten really long. Maybe you should get it cut soon." Dad noted.

"I like my hair long." I told him as I brushed it. Normally I kept my hair at shoulder length, but I had let my hair grow down to my waist. It was nice having long hair but at the same time it was a pain. The only reason I let it grow so much was because Valerie always said that I would look better with long hair, not that I was going to tell Dad that.

"You what I've always wondered?" I started.

"No what?" Dad replied as he laid back on the bed.

"Why do you think my hair is red?" I said. " I mean, you and Mom have blonde hair, and so does Al. And from you've told me about your parents, your mother had brown hair and your father blonde. Mom said that her parents were blonde too, so... where did I get my red hair?"

I turned around to see if Dad had the answer, but what I saw on his face was something I didn't expect to see. It was horror, shear horror. He was sitting up on the end of the bed, staring at me. His eyes were so wide that I thought for a second that they were going to come popping out of his head.

"Woah, Dad, what is it? Is something wrong?" I asked.

Dad said nothing. He just looked at me in horror. After a minute he finally spoke. "You should get some sleep, we're going to have a long day tomorrow." He stood up to leave.

"Hey, but wait a sec-"

"Night Nora." He swiftly left the room.

I looked at the door for a moment, confused with what just happened. After trying to process, I gave up and decided to turn in. Dad was right about one thing, tomorrow was going to be a long day.


	10. Chapter nine

I stood in a black space. There was nothing around me, no floor, no walls, no ceiling, and no light. I couldn't even see my hand in front of my face. I started walking hoping that maybe I would find something, or someone. After what seemed like forever I heard a voice calling my name. I spun around looking for the where it was coming from. Slowly I started to hear more voices, and at first I thought they were calling my name, but then I realized that they were calling someone named "Mara".

"Who's Mara?" I asked aloud.

"You are, silly." said a voice.

I spun around. "What? No, my name's Nora."

"That's the name they gave you, but your real name is Mara." said another voice.

"What are you talking about?" I continued to spin around, looking for whoever was talking.

"Of course she wouldn't know what we're talking about, they never told her." another chimed in.

"Who didn't tell me what?" I asked. "Can someone please explain what's going on?"

"Should we tell her?" One voice suggested.

"No, they should be the ones to tell her." Said another.

"If we wait for them to tell her, then she'll be in the dark forever." Another added.

One after another, the voices started talking, getting louder and louder. It soon became to much for me to handle.

"ENOUGH!" I yelled.

All the voices stopped at once. As soon as the voices stopped, the area changed. I went from standing a black space to being in the field by my house in Resembool. A cool breeze passed over the hills, causing the long grass to bend. I pushed my hair out of my face and looked around. I saw the road leading from the train station, I made my way down the hill to the road. As I walked to the road, I saw some kids running in my direction. The two kids came into view, and I recognized them instantly.

"Adam! Valerie!" I called.

I ran down the hill to get to them. "Adam! Valerie! Hey!" I continued to call their names as I ran down the hill. But they didn't seem to hear me. I got to the bottom of the hill and waited from them to see me but they never did, they ran right past me.

"Hey, you two wait a second!" I ran after them. They were fast for their size, I couldn't catch up with them.

I followed them all the way to the house, where Mom and Dad were standing on the porch.

"Hi Mommy! Hi Daddy!" Adam and Val called at the same time.

"Come on you two, lunch is ready." Mom waved them both into the house.

I stood there, at the bottom of the stairs, speechless. Could they not see me? I couldn't understand what was going on.

"Mara."

I turned around. Behind me stood a man, he was tall and a bit on the lanky side, had a angler face with a short beard, and his eyes were a bright emerald green, and his hair was the same shade of red as mine.

"Who are you?" I asked.

"I can't tell you that." He said, "Not yet. You're not ready to know everything."

"Know what? Whats going on?" I was so lost.

"Don't worry Mara, you'll get the answers soon enough." The man said, then turned to walk away.

"That's not my name." I told him. "My name is Nora."

The man looked over his shoulder at me. "That's what you think." Then he vanished.

The scene around me slowly started to fade, and change into the night of the incident, only this time I was watching the whole thing from a third person point of view.

I watched everything unfold the same way, the difference was instead of me being the one who tried to stop Valerie, it was Adam.

I watched as he followed her through the woods to the house. Watched as he jumped into the transmutation, but failed to stop it. And I watched as he lost his arm and his leg.

But there was one major difference, Valerie lived. I watched in amazement, as I saw Valerie move after the transmutation was done. Adam was writhing in pain from the lose of his arm and leg, but he never passed out the way I did. Valerie crawled over the where he was and waited for someone to come.

"You see?" said a voice. "She would have lived if you hadn't been the one to find her."

I woke up in a cold sweat. I didn't scream, like I normally did after waking up from a nightmare. I laid in the bed, staring at the ceiling for a few minutes before getting up. I washed my face, and when I looked up in the mirror, I was startled. My face was pale, and I had bags under my eyes, but that wasn't what caught me off guard. The color of my eyes was different. Instead of their normal bright green, they were a weird shade of purple. I blinked a few time, and I saw them slowly change back. I stood in front of the mirror, and after a moment concluded that I was just tired and was seeing things.

I want back to the bed, and instead falling back asleep, I pulled out a notebook. On the cover of the book it read 'Nightmare Journal Vol. 7'. I don't remember, who or why, but someone had suggested to me that I should write down what happened in my nightmares. In the beginning, I had nightmares about every night, and if I fell back asleep after waking up, I would have the same nightmare over and over again. Now I was having the nightmares about once a week, but when I would wake up from them, I would almost always wake up either screaming or crying.

I wrote down every detail of the dream, and in the end it took up two pages, which was short compared to the rest of them. Most of them were about four to ten pages long.

After finishing that, I pulled out an alchemy book. It was one of Al's research books, it was for alkahestry. I had never learned anything passed the basics with alkahestry, but I thought that knowing more would get me into a better position once I became a state alchemist. Not many people in Amestris knew how to use alkahestry, or even what it was.

I read and reread Al's notes until the sun came up, and Dad knocked on my door.

"One second," I called. I made my voice sound groggy, as if I was still waking up. I hide the notebook under one of the pillows. I ruffled my hair up before opening the door. "Mornin'."

"Morning, how'd you sleep?" Dad asked as he came in. He was already dressed.

"Fine, on and off." I told him as I pulled an outfit out of my bag.

"We have to meet Mustang at headquarters in about an hour." Dad reminded me.

"Yeah, I know."

I changed and finished getting in the bathroom. I came out wearing a pair of black jeans, a white tank top, black combat boots, the flamel necklace, and sleeveless version of Dad's old red jacket. I quickly put my hair into a sloppy braid.

"Okay, I'm ready." I said.

"Um..."

"What?" I asked.

"Can I please fix your braid?" He asked.

I sighed. "We don't have the time for me to sit and let you make my hair perfect."

"Please?" He asked again. This time he made a puppy dog face. I sighed and sat down next to him. I had a hard time saying no to that face.

He proceeded to take the next ten minutes to do my hair, which in turn made us late.

"This is why I don't like letting you do my hair!" I called to him as we ran down the street.

We came up to headquarters with Roy and Riza waiting out front. Roy didn't seem to happy.

"Really?" He said as we came up.

"Sorry," I panted. "Blame him." I pointed over my shoulder to Dad.

"Hey." Dad breathed. "It's not my fault that you can't braid your own hair."

Roy just sighed, then opened the car door. "Get in."

Dad and I hopped in the back. We drove for a few minutes until we found ourselves in front of a every large estate.

"We're here." said Roy.

Dad and I got out of the back. As I walked to the house, I heard Dad gasp. I turned around to see him frozen in place, and as white as a sheet.

"Dad," I walked back over to him. "Are you okay?"

He said nothing, he just looked over to Roy. "Yes, this is the same house Ed."

Dad looked back at the house, then muttered. "The old Tucker Estate."

Tucker. That name made a lot of bells go off in my head. Shou Tucker ,the Sewing-Life Alchemist, was one of the first things to come to mind. The second was his daughter Nina. Dad and Al used to often say that the reason that they were always looking for different types of alchemy was because they had failed to save a little girl named Nina, and they wanted to prevent anything like that from happening again.

I looked at the house then back at Dad. "Are you going to be okay?" I asked.

"I think so." He said.

I walked next to him up to the house. We stood behind the Mustangs as they rang the doorbell. We waited for a moment before someone answered the door.

"Can I help you?" It was a little girl who couldn't be much older then five or six.

I looked up at Dad, and saw that he had gotten paler. "Are you sure you're going to be okay?" I whispered.

"I'll be fine." He said. I could tell he was lying, because he had taken hold of my hand, and his was shaking.

"We're here to meet with Garth Van Hunt. Is he home?" Asked Roy.

"One second please." Said the little girl. She closed the door. After a moment the door opened again, this time next to the little girl stood an older man, he looked to be in his late forties, early fifties. He was bald, and had a goatee that was completely grey. He was well built for a man of his age, I could tell just by looking at him even with the baggy shirt he was wearing that he was strong. His eyes were what caught my attention, they were green, but it was like they had a thin grey film over them.

"General Mustang. I had almost forgotten that you were coming," He extended his hand out.

Roy shook it. "It's fine, we're a little late."

"Please come in." The man said stepping aside.

Roy and Riza went in first and I followed, leading Dad in as he still held my hand.

"Are you alright sir?" The man asked Dad.

"Yes, I'm fine thank you." Dad said as he passed.

We were lead to a living room by the little girl. Once we were all seated she asked if anyone wanted some tea.

"No, thank you." Said Dad waving her off.

"I'll have some please." I told her. "Three sugar cubes and no milk."

Roy said no, and Riza asked for just a glass of water. The girl nodded after taking the orders and went into the kitchen.

As the girl was leaving, the man came into the room. He patted her on the head as she walked pass him.

"She's really cute."I said to him as he sat down across from me. "Is she your daughter?"

"Ella? No, she my granddaughter. Her parents are traveling for a few days for their work, and they had asked if she could stay here." He told me with a laugh.

"I see." I smiled.

"Why don't we get the introductions out of the way shall we? I'm Lieutenant General Garth Van Hunt. But feel free to call me just Van Hunt."

"You're a Lieutenant General?!" I said, shocked. The highest ranked person I had meet before now was Roy and he was a Major General, which meant that this man was a rank higher.

"Yes, but I'm retired now, so there's no need to be formal." He said, waving off my surprise.

"It's nice to meet you. I'm Nora. Nora Elric." I said as I reached my hand out.

"Elric." He shook my hand. "So then the man with you is your father Edward?"

"Yes, sir." Dad extended his hand.

"Did you know the previous owner of this house? The Tuckers?" Van Hunt asked.

Dad paused mid-handshake. "What?"

"You seemed uneasy coming in, so I just wanted to make sure that you were okay being in here."

"I'm fine, thank you."

Van Hunt seemed skeptical, but dropped the topic and turned back to me. "So Nora, I understand that you want to be a state alchemist."

"Yes, sir." I nodded.

"Before we get into why you want to train with weapons, I have a couple of basic questions I'm going to ask you first."

I nodded.

"Okay, how old are you?"

"Seventeen."

"Favorite color?"

"Any cool color."

"Any siblings?"

"Yes."

"How many?"

"Two." I answered automatically. "Oh, wait, I mean one." I corrected myself.

"Why did you change your answer?" He asked.

"Um... Force of habit." I told him.

He raised an eyebrow, but continued.

"Their names?"

"Adam."

"And the other?"

I paused for a second. "Valerie."

"Younger or older?"

"Both younger."

"Okay." He paused. "What do you do in your free time?"

"Read, or write."

"Write what?"

"Alchemy theories."

"What books do you read?"

" Fantasy novels, historical fictions."

"You have very interesting taste." He laughed a little.

"Yeah well, I love alchemy but I do need a change of pace from it every now and then."

"If you couldn't be a state alchemist, what would you be doing?"

"I don't know."

"So, you don't have a backup plan? If you fail the test?"

"I won't fail the test." I told him.

"But if you did-" He started.

"I wouldn't fail."

"Why? Why wouldn't you fail?" He asked.

"Because I couldn't, I can't fail the test." I said bluntly.

"You're not answering my question." He said with a sigh. "Why can't you fail the state alchemy exam?"

"Because if I fail, I can't move forward. And I need to move forward, to find what I'm looking for."

He looked at me for a long moment then said, "Okay then."

"May I ask you a question?" I said to Van Hunt.

"You want to ask me a question? Sure, go ahead." Van Hunt said as he leaned back against the chair he was in.

Ella then came back with a tray. She first handed Van Hunt a cup, then gave Riza her water and then handed me my cup of tea. I took it from her with a smile, "Thank you."

She nodded, then retreated out of the room. I handed the cup to Dad. "You need it." I told him. Dad rolled his eyes at me, but still took the cup. He looked at it for a second before sipping on it.

I turned back to Van Hunt. "Are you blind?"

His eyebrows shot up. "How could you tell?"

I smiled a little. "From your eyes for one, they look like there's a gray film over them, and whenever you look at me, it's more like you're looking pass me."

"Wait a second. You're blind?" Dad interjected.

"Half blind actually, but yes. That's why I'm retired. I was wounded in a battle that ended up blinding me."

"Then how are you-"

"Just because I'm blind, that doesn't mean I'm incapable of training your daughter Mr. Elric." Van Hunt responded to Dad.

I patted Dad's leg. "It's okay."

Dad looked me for a moment before leaning back against the couch and sipped on his tea. I turned to Van Hunt. "Can we continue?"

He nodded. "Okay next question. How did your automail?"

My stomach dropped.

"You are wearing a sleeveless shirt no? I can see the different colors of you arms, plus I can hear the gears when you move."

I thought rapidly. "I was born missing the limbs."

"That's a lie."

My stomach dropped farther.

"I would advise you against lying to me. I can always tell when someone is lying."

My mind was racing. I couldn't think. I didn't want to tell him the truth, but I couldn't lie. Before I could come up with something else to say, Roy spoke.

"General. I understand that you want to know everything, but I did tell you-"

Van Hunt put his hand up, but didn't turn away from me. "I remember what you told me Mustang. But I still want answer to all my questions."

Dad went to speak, but I stopped him. "An alchemy accident." I said to Van Hunt.

Roy and Dad looked at me, both a little panicked, then they both turned to Van Hunt to watch his reaction. He looked at me for a long moment, then just nodded. "Okay."

I sighed with relief and waited for his next question.

"Just one more question. Adopted or related?"

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Are you adopted or are you related to your family?" Van Hunt asked again.

"What kind of question is that? Related of course." I said to him.

He looked from me, then to Dad. I looked at Dad too, and could tell that he was tensed up.

"Are you okay Dad?" I asked.

"I'm fine." He answered quickly.

"Okay, now." Van Hunt Said standing up. "Come on Nora, we're going to take a walk."

"Huh? Why?"

"I want you to tell me the whole story. Everything, and I find the people talk more when they're walking."

"Um, okay" I stood up and Dad started to follow, but Van Hunt waved him off.

"Just Nora."

Dad looked at him surprised. Before Dad could protest, Van Hunt spoke. "People also tend to tell others more when they're not feeling pressured."

Dad turned to me, I waved him down. He sighed and sat back down.

"We'll be gone for a little while." Van Hunt said as we walked out.

We made our way down the street. After we turned the corner Van Hunt spoke. "You can start."

I looked at him. "Start with what?"

"With telling me why you want to be a state alchemist, and why you want to learn about weapons from me."

I laughed without humor. "Where should I start? The story is a long one."

"Start at wherever you feel the beginning is."

I thought for a minute. "What if I don't want to tell you everything?" I asked.

"Then you'll have to find another teacher. Because I don't take on student when I can't understand what's driving them, and if I don't trust their motives completely" He said bluntly.

I looked at him then sighed and picked a starting point. I ended up beginning with the day before Valerie vanished. I told him every detail, the gift I got from Dad, the fight with Valerie, the next's day's events, everything. I even told him the details about the three mouths when we didn't know where Valerie was. I left out the smaller things, as to keep myself from sounding like I was rambling. We had been walking for a while when I finally got to the day when I found her. I got to the part where I found the old house in the clearing then moved on to what happened in the basement of the house when I felt myself about to gag.

"Are you okay?" Asked Van Hunt.

I couldn't answer. I leaned over and started to heave. Van Hunt put his hand on my back and just let me go for a minute. He handed me a handkerchief after I stopped.

"Let's take a break from the long story for a minute, and talk about something else, okay?" Van Hunt said. I could hear a bit of worry in his voice.

I nodded.

We walked for a little while, without saying a word. Finally I spoke.

"Sorry about that. I don't know why that happened."

"Don't worry about it. Let's just talk about something else."

"Like what?"

"Like, how did you get into alchemy?"

"My dad and uncle. My dad used to go on a lot of trips when I was little and whenever he and Al were both back at the same time, they would talk for hours about the things they had found and seen."

"And you would listen in?" Asked Van Hunt.

"Yeah. And one day, I had asked Dad to read me a book to me, he told me to go and get one, so I went into his room and grabbed one of his alchemy book and went running back downstairs." I said with a slight smile.

"And the rest is history." Van hunt said, smiling back.

"Yeah."

We walked for another block before Van Hunt put his hand on my shoulder.

"Here we are." We had stopped in front of a empty cafe. Van Hunt sat down at one of the tables on the sidewalk, he waved for me to sit across from him. I took a seat.

A waiter came up to us and handed us two menus. "Should I get you the usual Mr. Hunt?" The waiter asked.

"Yes, thank you."

"And you miss?" The waiter turned to me.

"Oh, um, I'll have some lemonade."

The waiter nodded then walked back inside.

"Do you come here a lot?" I asked Van Hunt.

"Every other day. I've made it my habit since I moved into that house."

I nodded at the waiter came back with our drinks. "Can I get you anything to eat?"

"I'll have some stew, if it's ready." Said Van Hunt.

The waiter nodded. "Miss?"

"I'll just have some chicken soup." I said, as I handed the waiter the menu.

He nodded, then left us again.

"Can you continue?" Van Hunt asked.

My stomach dropped and knotted as I thought about recounting everything again. I looked down at the ground and wrapped my arms around my stomach, as the edges of my vision started to blur.

"Nora, look at me." Van Hunt's voice was level but concerned.

I closed my eyes, and tried to slow my panted breathing. When I closed my eyes, I was hit with a crowd of voices, so many that it just made everything worse. I got up quickly and when to the edge of the sidewalk to hurl. What was wrong with me? I couldn't understand what was going on. I collected myself then sat back at the table.

"What are you so afraid of?" asked Van Hunt.

"I'm not afraid." I told him, panting slightly.

"Nora. I already told you, you can't lie to me. I can hear your heart racing and you're panting. You are scared."

"I'm not scared!" I snapped.

Van Hunt just sighed. "Nora. There's no real point in lying to me. Unless of course you don't really want me to train you."

"No!" I answered quickly. "I want you to train me."

"Then, tell me what you're a afraid of."

I looked up at him for a long moment and stared into his grey-green eyes. They were tired and old, but they held conviction, and despite that I knew Van Hunt couldn't see me clearly, they seemed to be staring right back at me.

Finally, I sighed and gave in. "I'm afraid of what everyone will think if I tell them the truth. I'm afraid they'll all hate me."

"Okay." Van Hunt said with a successful sigh."Now we're getting somewhere."

Our food came out then. The waiter placed the food down and told just that if there was anything we need, just to asked, then he left.

"Are you afraid that everyone will blame you for what happened to your sister?" Van Hunt asked.

"They know what happened, and the only one who blames me is my brother Adam."

"But you just said that you're afraid of what they'll think if they know the truth. So is there something you left out?"

I felt my heart stop.

"From that response, I'll say that you haven't told them everything.

I didn't respond.

"What haven't you told them?"

I snorted. "If I can't even tell my own family, how can I tell you?"

"Because, I don't know you they way they do, and you don't know me the way you know them."

I thought of a minute. "If I tell you, I want your word that you will not repeat it, to anyone."

Van Hunt nodded.

I took a deep breath then began. I told him about how I found Valerie and she had already started the transmutation, and that I jumped in, thinking at the time that if I did so, it would lessen the rebound on Valerie. I got to the part where I was standing in front of 'Truth' when I paused.

"This is the part where you would lie."

I nodded."I feel like I've said the same lie so many times that,I don't really remember what the truth is."

"But we both know that the truth, especially for something like this, is hard to forget."

I nodded, then closed my eyes and continued. But as I went to speak, I could feel my heart rate increase and my hands start to shake. The voices in my head started to grow in magnitude. But I pushed passed it.

"I asked 'Truth' what I paid for my toll, it's response to me was to me was my arm, my leg, and..." My voice started to get caught in my throat. "My soul."


	11. Chapter Ten

Van Hunt's eyebrows shot up. "What?"

I looked up at Van Hunt's face, and I could clearly see that he was confused. After a moment he spoke. "Your soul? Is losing that even possible?" he asked.

"I had a hard time making sense of it too at first, but if you think about it, it does make some sense."

"Explain, please."

"You know what happened to my dad and his brother Al, right?" I asked.

"I know most of it, they preformed a human transmutation, and your father lost his leg and his brother lost his whole body."

"Yes, and to bind Al's soul to a suit of armor, my dad gave up his arm." I finished.

Van Hunt nodded.

"If the body can be taken with the soul, and then the soul brought back without its body, why wouldn't it be possibly to take the soul without taking the body?"

"Okay, when you say it like that, it makes a little more sense." Van hunt said, nodding in understanding. "Now that I understand that, can you tell me what happened next?"

I nodded slowly, then proceed to finish telling him what happened. After I finished, we sat in silence and ate the food in front of us, although it had gotten cold. Van Hunt paid for the food and we started walking back. I looked up at the sky as we walked, the sun was setting, and it made the clouds different shades of pink and orange.

I felt lighter, like something was lifted off of me. I guess it was from telling Van Hunt the truth. I never realize how much that lie weighed me down.

"So, now that we have the long story out of the way," Said Van Hunt. "Why don't you tell me about why you want to train with weapons."

I laughed. "Really?"

He nodded.

I thought for a minute. If I was being honest, there was no reason for it, I just liked the idea. I shrugged. "Because, Valerie always wanted to, plus I just thought it would be cool."

Van Hunt laughed. "Okay. We should get back, your dad's probably really worried."

"Yeah."

We got back to the house and it was dark out. Van Hunt opened the door and Ella came running.

"Grandpa!"

"Hey Ella, whats up?"

"Its Mr. Elric." Ella said with a pout.

"Whats wrong with my Dad?" I asked, suddenly nervous.

"He's in the basement, and he won't come out."

"Can you show me the way?" I asked Ella.

She nodded, then lead the way down. She stopped outside a door, where Roy and Riza were standing.

"How long has he been in there?" I asked them.

"Pretty much since you left." Roy said with brows connected.

I walked up to the door and knocked. "Dad? Are you okay?"

There was no answer.

"You guys stay out here, I'm going to go in." I turned around to everyone.

"Are you sure?" Asked Riza.

I nodded. "I've got it." I opened the door. "Dad? I'm coming in."

I walked into the room. There were no lights on, and from what I could see there was only a few things in the room, a desk, a bookcase, and cages... stacks of them against the wall.

"Dad?" I looked around the room, and I saw him sitting against the wall. I could hear him breathing from the doorway. I walked over to him and put my hand on his shoulder. He flinched away from me. His eyes seemed far away, like he was looking into the past.

"Dad, it's me, Nora."

He looked at me. "Nora." His voice was hoarse.

"Yeah, its me. Come on lets go, okay?" I put my hand out to him. He took it and I pulled him up. I held his hand as we walked out. I looked at Roy, "Can you get the car?"

He nodded, then left and Riza followed.

I turned to Van Hunt. "Thank you for today."

He nodded. "I'll be in touch."

"Bye Ella." I said with a smile.

She smiled slightly, and waved.

I walked Dad to the car. We slid in the back, and went back to the hotel.

We pulled up, Dad got out of the car and went strait inside.

"Thank you." I said to Roy as I got out.

"No problem, just..."

"I'll make sure that he's okay."

Roy nodded. "We'll see you tomorrow."

I watched as they pulled away, then rushed upstairs to Dad's room. I knocked on the door and waited for him to answer before going in.

"Dad? Are you in here?" I looked around. After a moment I realized that the shower was running.'Okay,' I thought, 'He probably just needed to cool off.' I sat down on the bed and waited. It was about a half an hour before I heard the shower turn off. I knocked on the door. "Dad? Are you okay?"

He didn't answer.

"Dad?"

After a minute he answered. "Yes, Nora?"

I sighed. "Okay, I just wanted to make sure that you were okay after today."

"I'm fine."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, Nora."

"Okay..." I was skeptical, but I didn't want to push the topic.

I went back to my room and changed into a pair of P. J's then went back. I opened the door, and saw that he was already in bed. Whether or not he was really asleep, I wasn't sure, but I decided to leave him alone. It was still early, so I went downstairs to the main lobby to call home. I spoke to Mom first.

"Hi, mom." I said when she picked up.

"Hi Nora, how did everything go today?"

"It went okay, I think that he'll take me on as his student but I have to wait for him to call back."

"Yeah, well that's still okay. How's your father doing?" She asked.

"He's okay," I lied. "He had a long day too, so hes upstairs resting." I didn't want to tell her what happened for two reasons. One, I didn't want her to worry about it too much, I was going to try and handle it in the morning, and two, I wasn't sure if dad had ever told her that story, there were somethings that Dad never told mom about.

"Okay, good."

"Hey, is Al still there?" I asked.

"Yeah he's here, you want to talk to him?"

"Yeah." I waited a moment as the phone exchanged hands.

"Hey Nora, whats up?" Al answered, he sounded out of breath.

"Are you okay?" I asked. "You sound winded."

"Yeah, I was just sparring with Adam."

"What? Adam was sparring?" That was surprising, Adam normally didn't like fighting, for a couple of reasons, one of which being that I would beat him all the time.

"Yeah, he's actually a good fighter." Al said with an approving tone. "So anyway, how was the meeting?"

"It was okay. Dad wasn't too happy about the house he lived in though."

"Why? Was there something wrong with it?"

I paused. "It was the old Tucker house."

There was silence on the other end.

"Al?" I waited for a moment.

"Um... I just..."

"Sorry, maybe I shouldn't have said anything."

"No, its fine. But... how's Ed?"

"He's reliving the memories and beating himself up for it again. I went for a walk with Van Hunt, the man who now owns the house, and when I came back I found him in the basement, sitting against the wall, completely zoned out."

Al was silent for a moment. "Have you tried talking to him?"

"I was going to wait until morning, plus he's already asleep."

"Check in on him before you go to bed."

"Why? Do you think that he's not really sleeping?"

"No, but he might wake up from a nightmare, it happened the last time we visited that house."

"Oh, okay, got it."

"And another thing, I'm leaving for East City early tomorrow morning, so if you're going to talk to him, can you wait until I get there?"

"Yeah, sure. What time should you be getting in? We can meet you at the station."

"I should be in around lunch, so maybe around noon?"

"Yeah, okay, we'll be there." I looked up at the clock that was behind the desk. "It's getting kinda late. I should get to bed."

"Yeah okay, just check on Ed, please."

"You got it Al, I'll see you tomorrow."

"Yeah, see ya." He then hung up the phone.

I put the phone back then went to Dad's room. I opened the door quietly and popped my head in. "Dad?" I whispered. I went in and sat down in a chair by the window. I figured I never get any sleep anyway, so I might as well wait in Dad's room to see if he did wake up.

I sat in his room for about an hour, nothing. I was reading some of Dad's notes for about the third time, when he started talking in his sleep. I walked over to him to hear what he was saying.

At first he was muttering, then he started to speak clearer. "Nina... Alexander..."

'He's reliving it in his dreams. Maybe I should wake him up now before it gets bad.' I thought. I went to shake him, but he started speaking again.

"Mom... I'm sorry..." He muttered. "Nora..."

My heart stopped. Why was he saying my name? I waited to see if he would say anything else. But he went back to just muttering. I waited a moment, then was going back to my seat, when he shouted and sat up quickly.

"Dad!" I went back over to him. "Are you okay?"

He was breathing heavily. "Nora."

"Yeah, its me."

"What are you...?"

"I talked to Al early, and he asked me to keep an eye on you after what happened today."

He was trying to regain his breath. "I'm sorry."

"Why are you apologizing? It's okay." I was suddenly reminded of all the times that I woke up from a nightmare and I would just keep saying 'I'm sorry'.

We sat there for a few minutes, then Dad said he was okay and told me to go back to my room. I looked at him with a raised eyebrow, but left him alone. It was late and I felt that if I pushed the topic right now it might lead to an argument.

I went to my room and tried to sleep, but couldn't. Why did Dad say my name? Was he seeing what I looked like when he found me and Val? I wanted to ask, but it was probably a bad idea to do so. I would just wait until Al was here to ask any questions. I stayed up the rest of the night reading a book and thinking about a thousand different things.


	12. Chapter eleven

I went downstairs early the next morning. I was super tired, having sat up the whole night, worrying about Dad. This was really unlike him. I knew that the Tucker thing had scared him, but I didn't know it was like this.

I went to the dinning hall and got some breakfast, although I wasn't really hunger. The past few days I hadn't felt hunger. I went the first two days here without eating, which made Dad worry. I just didn't feel hungry, which was what I told him, but he still forced me to eat. I looked down at my plate, stabbed a piece of sausage, and put it in my mouth. It felt wrong as I swallowed, like I was eating on a full stomach.

As I tried to eat, Roy and Riza came by.

"Good morning." Said Roy as he sat down across from me. He seemed in an abnormally good mood.

"Mornin'" I said as I sipped on my glass of milk.

"How are you this morning, Nora?" Riza asked as she sat down next to Roy.

"I've been better."

I watched to two of them for a moment. Riza placed her hand on the table and Roy put his on top. Roy looked at her with a look I knew from my parents. I mourned and rolled my eyes.

Roy shot a look at me. "What?" He asked.

"I don't care what you two do in your free time, but I really don't want to see you in your 'after sex lovey dovey' mood." I said as I waved a waiter over.

They looked at each other, and blushed a bright red. Riza looked down at the floor and Roy turned back to me. "Can you not say things like that in public?" He said though his teeth.

I shrugged. "It's early in the morning and I'm going off a night with no sleep, so my mental filter isn't working right now." I handed the waiter my plate.

Roy mumbled something, then sighed. "So, where's Fullmetal?"

"Dad's still in his room. Feel free to go and bug him if you like." I told them as I stood up.

Roy looked at me with a raised eyebrow. "You want me to go and bug your father?"

"I'd like to see if you can get him to come out of his room. And knowing you, you'll probably say something that well make my Dad want to kill you so he'll have to get up."

"That's what I am? His alarm clock?" Roy said, sounding insulted.

"For the moment, yes." I said as I pushed in my chair. Roy rolled his eyes.

"Where are you going?" Asked Riza, speaking up.

"Just for a walk. I figured the fresh air would wake me up a bit."

"Do you mind if I go with you?" She asked.

"No, I don't mind at all." I said back with a smile.

"So you're both leaving me to deal with Ed?" Roy asked

"Yup." Riza and I said at the same time. We looked at each other and laughed, while Roy just shrugged.

Riza and I walked out of the hotel. I stopped out front and just let the air sink into my lungs, it felt like I hadn't been outside in ages.

"So, is Ed okay?" Riza asked as we started walking.

"I don't really know. I mean, last night, nether of us really got any sleep. He kept waking up from nightmares, and I just had a hard time sleeping in general." I told her.

"Did you talk to him about what happened yesterday?"

"No, I was going to do that this morning, then Al said that he was coming into the city today, so he asked me to wait until he gets here." We turned the corner. We walked a block, before I remembered something. "Have you talked to Ashbel?" I asked.

"I talked to him the other day, why?"

"Two days ago, he calls me, at the hotel, and says that I should rethink what I'm doing. And that I shouldn't become a state alchemist."

"I know that Roy told him about why we were in East City, and that you were meeting with someone to train with. But I don't know why he would tell you not to be a state alchemist." Riza replied.

"It just bugged me. I've tried to talk to him for the past year, but he never took any of my calls, and then he just decides to tell me that I shouldn't try to be a state alchemist." I told her with a sigh.

"I didn't know that you had tried to talk to him. He always said that when he called you were the one that never wanted to talk."

I laughed. "You can ask one of his underlings, whenever I called his office, someone would answer telling that he was busy, or he was in a meeting or something. And they always said that I should just call back another day."

"He was worried about you, you know." Riza said. The look on her face reminded me of one that my mom would often put on when she wanted Val and I to get along.

"Well, if thats the case, he never told me." I said with a pout.

"Did you know that he was with the group that found you and Valerie?" She asked.

"Yes, I knew that."

"Did you know that he was the one who cauterized your wounds?"

I paused. "No... I didn't know that."

"The only reason he left before you woke up was because he had to. He wanted to be there, but he couldn't."

"Okay, I get that, but that still doesn't give me a reason for why he basically ignored me every time I tried to talk to him." I commented.

"Who were you with before you ran after Valerie?" Riza inquired.

"It was Ash..." Something clicked in my head as I said it, and I could see the point Riza was getting to. "Does Ash really blame himself just because he didn't run after me?"

Riza nodded. "He thought that maybe if had ran after you instead of going to get the others, that he might have been able to stop anything from happening."

"But that doesn't explain why he was avoiding me." I noted.

"He thought that you might be angry because of that."

I rolled my eyes. "I told him to go back and get my dad, why would I be mad? Honestly, what goes though his head doesn't make sense sometimes." We came back down the block to the hotel.

Riza laughed. "Men can be confusing."

"You don't have to tell me twice." I said with a snort.

We laughed as we walked back into the hotel. But we quickly stopped. Down in the lobby, Dad was arguing with Roy and Al. I walked over and got in between them.

"Hey! Whoa! What's going on?" I asked the three of them. "And Al, what are you going here? I thought that you weren't suppose to be here till noon?"

"I took a direct train in." He said to me. "And as to whats going on, Edward is being completely unreasonable." He turned on Dad.

"You have no idea what you're talking about Alphonse!" Dad snapped back.

This was really unusually, Dad and Al being on opposite sides of an argument. The fact that they were calling each other by their full names meant that this was serious.

"Okay! Okay, can we calm down for a minute, and be civilized about this?" I pleaded. I looked around the lobby, and pretty much everyone was looking at us. Riza was over talking to the desk clerk, and it looked like she was trying to talk him out of calling the police.

"Come on Fullmetal, you're overreacting!" Roy added. "You need to let this go."

Dad glowered at Roy. "'Let this go'? You want me to forget about the little girl I could have saved?!"

"Wait," I looked at Roy. "Did you say something about Nina to get him up?" I asked.

"No, but it came up when we meet Al down here." Roy said to me. "And thats not what I meant by 'let this go'!" He turned to Dad.

"You mocked the way I reacted yesterday!" Dad growled. "Both of you!" Dad pointed at Al and Roy.

"You sat in the basement of that house for hours!" Al snapped. "And you can't blame General Mustang and I for just asking why!"

The three of them came closer together, pushing me out of the middle, and started arguing again. I tried to stop them, but they just kept pushing me out and ignoring me. I had enough. I stepped back from them, absolutely furious. I clapped my hands together, and put them on the floor. Blue and red sparks started to fly and a wall formed in between the three of them, causing them to fall silent. I stood up and they all turned to me.

"Would you three stop acting like little kids already!" I snapped. "You are grown, adult men! Start acting like it!" They looked at me, bewildered, so I continued. "If you have a problem with each other ,then talk it out, like civilized human beings! Now, because of they way you were acting, you made it a big scene and made me snap!" I took a deep breath, sighed then continued. "Now, before this gets anymore out of hand, lets go upstairs and talk."

The three of them nodded, and Riza escorted them upstairs, while I fixed the floor. After I returned the lobby to normal, I went up to the room, trying to ignore the stares that followed me. When I got to the room, I found everyone waiting silently.

I sighed. "Now that everyone's calmed down, can we talk?"

"There really isn't that much to talk about, other then the fact the Mustang is an ass." Dad said as he sat down on the bed, folding his arms.

"You were the one who overreacted and caused the whole big scene downstairs." Roy said, leaning against the other wall. "And I think that your brother agrees with me."

Al said nothing but nodded.

Dad walked over and got into Roy's face. "You know what, I don't care who you are, you have no right to say that to me!"

"Okay! Okay!" I got in between them. "Dad, sit down, and Roy, why don't you just shut up for a change."

Dad back down and sat back down on the bed, while Roy just rolled his eyes.

I sighed. "Can I ask, without someone flipping out, how you got on the topic of the Tuckers?"

"I brought it up." Said Al. "I asked Ed what happened when he was at the house yesterday."

"Okay, but how did that lead to Dad snapping?"

"Because nothing happened." Dad growled.

I looked over to him with a raised eyebrow. "Really? You're actually going to say that?"

"It's the truth!" He snapped.

"You sat in the basement of that house, which by the way hasn't been touched since that incident, for hours. And you're going to say nothing happened?" I nagged him.

"You don't understand! None of you do!" Dad stood up. "You weren't there!"

"I was there Ed!" Al stepped in. "I remember that like it was yesterday! But what I don't understand is why you keep obsessing over it, even now! We couldn't have done anything!"

"Maybe if we had gone over sooner-!" Dad started.

"Don't even start with that!" I snapped.

Everyone looked over at me, Dad with his mouth still open.

"Don't start with the 'maybe if I did this' or 'if only I had done that'! Because whats done is done! And no matter how much you think about, no matter how much you go over very detail, it won't change anything!" I cried.

"What do you know Nora, you weren't there!" Dad quickly countered.

"You're right Dad, I wasn't there when Nina was turned into a chimera!" I snapped back, and Dad shuttered at the word chimera."But I was the one who found Valerie! And everyday for months, I went over everything in my head, so much to the point that I could tell you every little detail perfectly, thinking 'maybe if I was faster' or 'if only I hadn't yelled at her' or 'if I had only been a better sister.' Everyday! For months after that, that was all I thought about, what I could have done differently! But I know that won't change what happened, it won't bring her back, nothing will! So I moved on. And I think that you should too!"

Dad looked at me, stunned for a minute, then replied. "How can I ever forget something like that?!"

"I'm not saying to forget, Dad." I said though tears that were now falling. "That would be like saying to forget what happened to your leg, or my body. I will never be able to forget that, and neither will you. What I saying is forgive yourself, and move on. But never forget."

The room fell silent. I stood in front of Dad, crying, unable to stop. I covered my face with my hands. I hated crying in front of people, it made me feel weak.

Suddenly there was a knock at the door, and everyone flinched. I dropped my hands and watched as Riza answered it.

"Yes?" She said, her voice calm and smooth.

"There's a call downstairs for Gen. Mustang." It was the desk clerk.

Riza turned back to the room and Roy nodded. He quietly walked out of the room and Riza followed.

I wiped my face and turned to the door.

"Nora." Dad started, it almost sounded as if he was pleading.

"I'm going to my room to take a nap." I said, my voice a little horse.

I walked out of the room without another word being exchanged. In my room, I flopped back on the bed and stared at the ceiling.

'Maybe I should take my own advice.' I thought. Half of what I said to Dad was true, I obsessed over what had happened to me and Valerie, and I thought of every spot where I could have done something differently, and I knew that no matter how much I thought about what I could have changed, it didn't matter now, after the fact. But I hadn't moved on, and I definitely hadn't forgiven myself for it.

I sighed. "I really am hopeless, aren't I?" I asked the empty room.

Abruptly, I heard voices screaming out. I grabbed my ears as a reflex, but that didn't help, if anything it made it worse.

"Stop, please." I moaned.

But they didn't, they got louder, so loud that it started to hurt. They were all screaming the same thing, "Mara" over and over again.

"That's not my name." I said though my teeth.

Then, as abruptly as they started, they stopped. I let out a deep sigh, then held my hands out in front of me, and watched as red sparks jumped between my fingertips.


	13. Chapter twelve

Later, after I had cooled off, I went downstairs. On my way out of the hotel, the desk clerk called me over.

"Yes?" I asked.

"You're an alchemist, right?" He asked.

I raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, so?"

"I need a favor." He started.

"Nope. I don't do favors." I turned to walk away.

"Please, wait!" He called. He came out from behind the desk and stood in front of me. "Please. I can pay you."

I laughed a little without humor. "You work here as a desk clerk, what could you possible pay me?" I asked.

He looked around for a moment, then leaned in and whispered the amount in my ear. My jaw felt like it would hit the floor.

"What?" I looked at him, stunned.

"Please." He begged.

I looked at his face, he really looked desperate. But at the same time, something didn't right. "Sorry," I told him. "I can't help you."

"But-" He started.

"There are alchemists all over this city that are far more skilled then me, and I'm sure that they would gladly take you up on that price. Now excuse me." I pushed passed him.

I walked outside onto ,the now very busy, sidewalk. I looked around for a moment, then decided to just go with the flow of traffic. Within a few minutes I found myself in the shopping district.

"Well, I've got nothing better to do, might as well do some window shopping." I said to myself.

I walked passed each of the shops, stopping in front each to peak in the windows. As I walked, I could tell that the people around me stared at my automail, of course, it was kinda hard to miss considering I had the sleeves on my shirt rolled up passed my elbow. One person was even daring enough to come up to me and ask how I got it. "I was born missing my arm." was what I told them. They gasped slightly and apologized for asking. I thought that it was kinda funny that some people felt put-off by the sight of automail, it wasn't like it was uncommon. As a matter of fact, being an automail mechanic was one of the better paying jobs, if you lived in the right area for it.

I shrugged off the ones that continued to stare and made my way down the street. As I stood it front of a dress shop, I heard a fight start down the street. I tried to see what was going on throw the crowd that formed. I walked over and pushed my though to see better. The fight wasn't really a fight, it was more like a beating. The one guy that was on the ground was wearing a suit, and he was on his knees, getting kicked constantly by the other, who was massive, and hugely buff in a way that reminded me of Sig or Armstrong, and was probably at least a foot over the guy on the ground. I looked around at the crowd, and no one made a move to stop them.

I bit my lip, contemplating. _'Should I do something? Or just be a bystander, like the rest of these people?'_ I thought. I looked at the guy on the ground again then sighed. _'I'm going to regret this.'_

I stepped forward, out of the crowd, and into the ring. "Hey don't you think that you've beaten him up enough?"

The big guy looked up. "Excuse me?" He said in a deep voice.

I swallowed hard, then repeated. "Don't you think that you've done enough?"

The guy looked at me, and cocked his head slightly to the side. "And you think that you're going to stop me, little girl?"

My ear twitched. "'Little'?" I said though my teeth. "Did you just call me little?"

He chucked. "Yeah, so what?" He stepped away from the guy on the ground, and came and stood over me. "You are very little. As a matter of fact you're about the size of an ant to-"

"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU CALLING SO SMALL THEY'RE SMALLER THEN ANTS!" I snapped. I jumped up under his chin and headbutted him.

The man staggered backward, holding him chin. He looked at me, wide eyed and enraged. He spit out some blood on to the street. "Now you've asked for it."

He came at me full force. I ducked under his punch and used my right leg and kicked his rib cage. He barely even moved. He went to kick me, and I blocked it with my left arm. I heard something snap on the impact. He yelled out in pain, and crouched to the ground. I went up to him and punched him dead in the face, causing him to fall back on to the sidewalk, passed out cold.

"No one calls me small and gets away with it." I said walking away from him.

I ignored the murmuring from the crowd and walked over to the man still on the ground. "Are you alright, sir?" I asked him.

"Thank you," he panted. "I'll be okay"

"Here," I held my hand out to him. "Let me help you up."

"Thank you." He said as I pulled him to his feet.

"No problem. I figured if no one else was going to help, then I would have to."

He smiled slightly, then couched up a little blood.

"Are you sure you're okay?" I asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I'll be fine in a minute." He said after another couch.

"Can I walk you to where ever it was that you were going?" I asked.

"Are you sure?" He asked with a small chuckle. "A cute girl like you doesn't have a place to be?"

"Perv." I muttered. "Never mind then." I started to walk away.

"Hey wait a second, I was joking." He stopped me. "Plus I would like to pay you back for stepping in."

"You don't have to do that." I said, waving him off.

"No, its fine, I want to. Please."

I thought for a minute. "Okay, then."

I followed him down the block to where his car was parked. As we walked, I looked at his face. His lower lip was cut and his eye was starting to bruise.

"If you want, I can heal that cut for you." I told him as we walked.

"Don't worry about it." He waved me off.

I shrugged. But after a minute, I looked back at where the cut was, and it was gone, and his bruise had healed as well.

Once we got to his car, and opened the driver side door and reached to grab his wallet. "Here you go." He said, handing me several large bills.

"I can't take this much money." I told him, trying to give some of it back.

"Please, I insist."

I looked at the money again. "Then, thank you ever much." I said with a slight bow.

"It's no problem, really." He said before looking at his watch. "Crap, I'm going to be late for my next class. Thank you again." He said quickly as he got in his car, and drove off.

I watched him drive away. I flipped thought the money quickly, double checking the amount. "Damn. He really didn't have to give me so much." I said as I counted. As I got to the center of the money, I found a business card. The card read, "East City University, Professor Selim King, Professor of Amestrian History."

 _'Selim... why do I know that name...'_ I thought. _'Oh, well. Maybe I'll remember later.'_ I shrugged as I walked back down the street to the hotel.

On my way back to the hotel, I bought a few things with the money I had received, a book for Adam, (although I doubt he'd take it), and a necklace for Mom. I also bought Dad a book on the city of Xerxes. I remember him at some point saying that his father was from there.

I walked back into the hotel, and there was another argument going on downstairs, but this time it was with a married couple. I ignored them and walked up to the desk.

"Excuse me."

The desk clerk spun around, it was a different one from earlier. "Oh, yes? How can I help you?"

"I was wondering if any calls have come in for Nora or Edward Elric?" I asked.

"Oh, um, yes there was. But someone came down and took the call."

"Okay, thank you." I said with a small smile, then proceeded upstairs to Dad's room.

I knocked, then opened the door with my key. "Hey Dad? Are you in here?" I called.

"Oh, Nora." Al came out of the bathroom.

"Hey, Al, where's Dad?"

"Roy called him into headquarters for some reason. He didn't say what."

"Oh, okay." I went and sat on the bed. "I guess I'll just wait for him here." I pulled out the book I had bought for Dad and started reading.

"What's that?" Asked Al.

"I went out for a walk and stopped in at a book store and found this." I showed him the cover. "Its a book about Xerxes. I saw it and thought I'd get it for Dad."

"A book on Xerxes? Really?" Al said, intrigued.

"There obviously isn't a lot, but I still thought it would be interesting."

"Do you mind if I read it?" He asked.

"When I'm done with it, sure." I told him.

He sighed slightly, then went over to the desk and started writing something in one of his notebooks.

We sat like that, in silence for the rest of the day.

* * *

I walked though Eastern Headquarters with my hands in my pockets and feeling rather annoyed. Mustang called me in, saying something had happened, but he couldn't tell me over the phone.

I walked in to Mustang's office with a huff. "So what exactly couldn't you tell me over the phone?" I asked with an eye roll.

But then I looked around the room. Everyone was either on a phone or running out to with files or to find someone.

"What the hell is going on?"

"Ed, you're here." Said a voice from behind me. I turned around and saw that it was Riza.

"What happened? Are we going to war or something?" I asked.

"Roy can tell you more then I can." She said as she pushed passed me into the busy room. I followed her and went up the Mustang's desk.

"Roy, what happened?" I asked as I walked up.

He looked over to me, he was on the phone. He held his hand up, signifying 'give me a moment'.

"Yes, sir. I understand completely." He said to the phone.

There was a slight pause.

"We are doing everything we can, and we will continue to do so until we have him again."

Another pause.

"Yes I understand Furïer Armstrong. I will oversee everything myself, thank you." He hung up.

"God, it's times like this where I really wish they had made me furïer over Olivier." Roy said as he rubbed his temples.

"What is going on? And why did you call me down here?" I asked, impatient.

"He escaped." Roy said shortly.

"What?"

"He escaped from his maximum security cell. He killed 3 guards in the process."

"Slow down for a second Mustang. Who broke out of prison?" I asked, completely lost at this point.

"Who do you think? I wouldn't have called you down here otherwise." He replied, sounding annoyed.

It took me a moment too long to understand. "Wait... You mean that..."

"Yes, Nora's biological father, Hans Dreyar."


	14. Chapter thirteen

I arrived back at the hotel at around eleven o'clock that night, more tired than I thought was possible. The main lobby was completely deserted, with the exception of the late night staff. I walked passed a maid in the hall on the way to my room, and I could tell from the look on her face, that I looked like hell was a truck and it had just run me over.

Before going in my room to completely pass out, I went to check on Nora. I opened her door as quietly as possible, and popped my head in. The room was pitch black, but there was a small amount of light from the window, coming in as a thin line between the blackout shades. I felt my way along the wall to the desk, and turned on the lamp that sat there. The light from the lamp quickly filled the room. After my eyes readjusted, I turned towards the two beds that were against the opposite wall.

Nora was sleeping on one, and Al on the other.

I raised an eyebrow. _Maybe they fell asleep while talking to each other?_ I thought.

I walked over to Nora first. She was wearing on one of my old shirts, that at some point she had taken and claimed as her own. She slept with her automail leg out from under the comforter, on her stomach, and half covered.

I laughed a little. _She still sleeps like she did when she was a baby._ I covered her up, and went to brush her hair out of her face, but stopped when she started to move.

 _Crap, did I wake her up?_ I thought, biting my lip.

"Not... Mara..." She murmured.

Every muscle in my body froze. _How does she know that name?_

She mumbled something else that I couldn't make out. I waited another moment before softly brushing her hair out of her face. _Please let it be that I heard her wrong..._

I looked at her again, then moved over to Al. I shook his arm hard until he woke up, a bit startled.

"Hm? Wha?" He said as he rubbed his eyes.

"Don't you have your own room to stay in?" I inquired.

"Oh, Ed. You're back." Al said, with a yawn.

"Oh, very perceptive." I noted.

"Be quiet." He said, shoving me lightly. "So, why did Roy call you in?"

"It's a long story. You sure you want to hear it?"

"Who's the main character?" Al pried, yawning again.

"Hans Dreyar." I said, shortly.

Al stopped mid yawn. "What?"

"Yeah, I had a similar reaction when Mustang told me why he called me in."

"Why Dreyar? What happened?" Al grilled, concern filling his voice.

"I'll tell you but," I looked over at Nora. "It might be better to tell you in my room."

Al looked at Nora too, then nodded.

I turned off the lamp light, and we both moved over to my room.

Al pulled out the chair at the desk. "So, what happened with Dreyar?" he asked again.

I plopped down on the end of the bed and kicked off my shoes. "You probably won't get back to sleep." I warned.

"I don't care. This is important." He pressed.

I sighed. _I guess I'm not getting any sleep either._ I thought meekly. "Okay, I start with when Mustang told me about Dreyar."

 _Shortly after Ed arrived at the office_

"Who do you think? I wouldn't have called you down here otherwise."

"Wait... You mean that..."

"Yes, Nora's biological father, Hans Dreyar."

I stared at Mustang wide eyed and panicked. I staggered back and had to sit down on the armrest of the couch, trying to just process.

Mustang turned to Riza and the rest of his men. "Clear the room, please."

Riza nodded and ushered the men out.

After the room was cleared and a few minutes of silent processing, I was finally able to get to the question that needed to be asked. "How?" I breathed, looking down at my feet, still a bit shocked.

"We don't know exactly." Roy sighed.

My head snapped up. "What do you mean you don't know?" I growled.

"Just that. We don't know." He stood up and walked around the desk.

I stood up, now angry. "How is that possible? He was in solitary, we spent months making new transmutation circles, specifically for him, so that he couldn't transmute, and we know that they worked. So then how?"

"I just said that I don't know Ed! You think that this doesn't piss me off too?" Roy snapped.

I looked at him, still a bit peeved, but took a deep breath and sighed. "Okay, what happened?" I inquired.

"What we do know is that he had help. That's the only way he could have gotten out. If he had attempted to transmute from inside the cell it would have rebounded, severely injuring him." Mustang explained, as if he was reading a report. "Plus, the cell door was blown into the cell, which means that someone on the other side of the door opened it for him."

"You said that he killed three guards?"

"Yes, that was on his way out, and we know that Dreyar was the one who killed them."

"How?" I wondered.

"He killed them the same way he used to." Roy noted. His voice as cold as Briggs.

My stomach dropped at the thought. "You mean... he took their souls?" I reaffirmed.

Roy swallowed. "Yes, probably to 'refuel', for lack of a better word."

I shook my head. "That's sick." I commented, making a gagging sound in the back of my throat.

"I agree." Roy nodded, echoing my disgust. "We should have found a way to have taken his stone when we had the chance."

"We didn't know how." I said with a shrug. "It's not like we could kill him."

"I still don't entirely understand what he is. He isn't a homunculus, but there's no way he's human either." Roy noted.

"He is human." I stated. "But what gave him the ability to heal was the philosopher's stone, that was in his body. He's like my father in that way."

"What do you mean like your father?" Roy pressed.

"Hohenheim was born human. He became immortal when he had a philosopher's stone, consisting of thousands of souls, transmuted into him" I explained. "The only difference being that Hohenheim didn't want the philosopher's stone in him, Dreyar did. Dreyar captured hundreds of thousands of people over time, and transmuted the stone into himself."

"Right, right." He nodded, remembering. "But still..."

"It doesn't make him any less of a monster or any more of a human. He and my father are two completely different people." I added.

"I know." Roy turned around and grabbed a file that was on his desk. "Anyway, back to his breakout. There's something else that's bothering me."

"What?"

"How did his partner even get into that part of the prison? It was maximum security, you could get there after about a dozen checkpoints, plus beforehand you have to tell them you're coming, otherwise they won't let you in, even at a high rank like mine."

"Yeah." I thought for a moment. "Maybe they used alchemy to make another way in?"

"No." Roy answered after flipping through the file. "We checked the entire grounds, there was no tunnel or anything made into the prison."

"Did you check outside the prison? Maybe they made a way in from outside the walls and then used the same way to get out and closed it when they were done." I asked.

"Hm... that would make a bit more sense. But there is still no way they could have gotten to Drayer without running into some guards." Roy crossed his arms and looked down at the floor.

I did the same and tried to come up with a way someone could have gotten pass any guards without being noticed. "Maybe..." I started. "They took the place of a guard and just walked right to Drayer without being stopped?"

Roy's head snapped up. "Now I feel like an idiot." He grabbed the phone. "How did I not think of that?" He said as he dialed a number.

"Maybe you didn't think of it because you're not me?" I told him with a smug smile.

He looked at me and rolled his eyes, then looked away when his call went though. "Yes, this is Major General Roy Mustang, I'd like to speak with Lieutenant Colonel Elicia Hughes. Yes, thank you."

"Elicia? She's on this case?" I asked.

Mustang nodded, still holding the phone to his ear. "And she knows everything."

My stomach knotted. I didn't like people knowing everything about Nora and where she came from. The list of people that knew was a short one, it was just Roy, Riza, Al, and me. Not even Winry or the Fuhrer knew everything, they knew some version of the truth.

It was Roy's idea to hide somethings from the Fuhrer, he felt that if she knew everything that she would want to deal with Nora, in someway, which I didn't like to think about. And when I brought Winry to see Nora for the first time in the hospital where she was being treated at the time, I couldn't tell Winry everything, partly because it was classified, partly because I had no idea how to tell her what had happened to Nora without her being terrified. So I told her that we had found Nora when we were on the raid and who her father was. Even after telling Winry everything I could tell her about Drayer, the first words out of her mouth were "We're adopting her."

I waited for Roy to finish with his phone call with Elicia, before looking back at him, and waited for him to speak. "Well?"

He hung up the phone and looked at me, with his arms crossed. "According to Elicia, there was one guard that had called out sick the other day and said that he would be out for a few days, but the logs say that he came into the prison, but there is no record of him leaving. Plus, they haven't been able to contact him."

"Then that's our guy." I said, standing up. "He either helped Drayer, or someone took his place."

Roy nodded. "Yes, that's the idea. Elicia is sending a group out to his apartment right now."

"You mean we're not going with them?"

"No. We're not."

"Why?!" I snapped. "We should be going with them!"

Roy just sighed. "Ed, you aren't even a military officer anymore, you're just a researcher. The only reason I called you in was because you and your family is personally involved, in regards to Nora being his daughter, blood wise anyway. Plus, I'm a Major General. I don't go out in the field much anymore."

I ground my teeth. "So you want me to just sit here and wait?"

Roy nodded. "Yes."

"Really? You expect me to just wait here while someone else goes to follow a lead?"

"Yes, that exactly what I want you to do."

"Oh, fuck this. I'm headed out." I stood up at made my way to the door.

"Ed, you can't."

"And why the hell not!? You just said that I'm personally involved in this!"

"That's exactly why you can't!" Roy snapped. "You are way too close to this! And honestly so am I, that's why I'm not out running the leads."

"How the hell are you too close to this?" I asked.

"I've watched Nora grow up, the same way you have. I remember when she was little she would call me uncle Roy. I want to keep her away from him as much as you, but I also know, there needs to be someone that can stay objective on a case like this. And that can't be you or me right now."

I looked at him for a long moment, before sitting down on the couch with a huff. "So, what do we do?" I asked.

"I was thinking that we should go through Drayer's old notes." Roy suggested. "I know they're old, but we did stop him in the middle of planning something."

"That's true." I nodded in agreement. "Where are they being kept?"

"The library. Where else?"

"The one here in east city?"

"Yup." Roy grabbed his coat from the back of his chair. "Let's go."

I nodded and followed him out.

We were accompanied to the library by Riza, Havoc, and Breda. The rest of Roy's men stayed at the office and tried to find more leads. Once we arrived at the library, Roy flashed his state alchemist watch and we were allowed through.

Once we had all the files in front of us, we became completely absorbed in them. It wasn't till the sun had completely gone down when we finally found something.

"Mustang…" I was the first to speak.

"What is it Fullmetal?" Roy asked, still looking at a file.

"Come over and look at this"

"What is it?" He said, still not looking up.

"I think I found what Drayer is planning."

Then his head shot up. "What?"

"Look," I put the file down on the table, and Roy put his down and came around to my side of the table. "He has this notation all over the files" I pointed to a spot on the page where it was noted 'MD' .

" 'MD'. I saw that all over my half of the files too." Roy noted.

"Yeah, it's either MD or ND. And the notes go up to the day before his arrest."

"Yeah that would be expected."

"But look." I put my finger on the page. "It says here 'MD likely to be taken in tomorrow's raid.' He knew we were coming."

"Wait… MD. Wasn't Nora's given name Mara before you and Winry opted to change it?"

I looked at him for a long moment before everything clicked in my head, then every muscle in my body tensed. "MD stands for Mara Drayer."

"Yeah… But what does ND stand for?" Mustang asked.

I knew without a second thought. "ND stands for Nora Drayer. Nora was the name of his wife."

Roy looked at me, shocked. "How do you know that he had a wife? It's not anywhere in the files, and the only reason I know is because Drayer told me." His sentence trailed off for a second as he realized. "You talked to him?"

"Not recently. I went to see him shortly after he was arrested, I wanted to know what experiments he had done on Nora. When I mention that Winry and I were planning on changing her name, we had already picked Nora, he said that was the name of his late wife."

"If you didn't name Nora after her mother, then why did you that name?" Roy asked

"Winry picked it. I don't really know why" I told him. It was a lie though, I knew about Drayer's wife before I even told Winry about Nora, but I couldn't tell Mustang how I knew that.

"Okay then. Back to the topic at, so he knew we were coming to arrest him, how?"

"I don't know, but I noticed something else." I grabbed a file from the stack of the ones I had already gone through. "Somewhere in here, he stops using 'ND'. The last time it's used is…" I flipped through the file, "here." I put my finger. "This is dated Oct 10, 1918"

"Isn't that about two months after Nora was born?"

"Nora's birthday is July 6th, so actually it's three" I corrected him.

"Right, right." Roy nodded. "What does it say about Nora's mother?"

I read over the page once before reading it aloud. "'ND has been inseparable from MD since her birth, which is inhibiting my project. Must resort to the final measure, through it pains me to do so'."

"What does that mean?" Roy asked.

"I don't know, but there is more." I continued reading. "It's from a few days later. 'The preparations have been made, ND will be sedated and brought down to the lab, along with MD'" I paused then found the next entry that was from later that same day. "'The procedure went without any problems. MD didn't even wake up from sleeping, ND had once said that she and MD would never be parted, now that's true.'"

"What the hell does that mean?" Roy asked, sounding annoyed.

I didn't need an explanation, I knew exactly what that meant as I read it. My stomach knotted and curled to the point where I almost couldn't hold it in. "He's just as sick minded as Tucker." I said in a whisper.

"What the hell does-" Roy stopped him sentence, as he too started to understand. "No…"

"Yes… He did…"

"But wouldn't there be physically proof of that on Nora's body? And it said that she didn't even walk up from sleeping, and something like that be immensely painful?"

"That's not what he meant." I said, my voice unable to go above a whisper. "Drayer had no notes on chimeras… His specialty was one thing…"

It only took a moment for Roy to understand. "Which was making philosopher's stones… So then he…" He seemed to choke on the rest of his sentence, as if saying it would make it true.

So I said it for him. "He took the soul of his wife, Nora's mother, and put it in Nora's body as a philosopher's stone."


	15. Chapter fourteen

Roy and I looked at each other, equally horrified. I could feel as all the blood drained from my face, and watched as Roy's did the same. My stomach started churning, and I felt like I was going to throw up.

"Oh my god…" Riza gasped.

Roy and I spun around, we had completely forgotten that we weren't alone. Riza stood by the door of the room, hands covering her mouth and her eyes wide. Havoc was sitting in a chair next to her, pale as a sheet and with wide eyes also, but other than that it looked like he hadn't moved. He sat, legs crossed and in one hand held a cigarette between two fingers, so loosely that he didn't even notice that it had fallen out of his hand and on to the floor. Breda was standing in the hallway, looking at us, shocked but confused, like he didn't know why he was shocked.

"Okay, so Drayer is such a sick bastard that he killed his wife and made her into a philosophers stone, but what does that mean for Nora?" Breda asked.

No one spoke for a minute, then Havoc spoke without turning to face him. "It means that Nora is-"

I stood up abruptly, cutting him off. "Don't say it."

"Why?" Havoc asked. "That's the truth, isn't it?"

"No, wait." Roy said, putting his hand up. "We shouldn't talk about this here. Let's head back to the office."

Riza nodded. "I'll get the car." She left, with Havoc and Breda following.

I stared blankly at the space where they had been. My mind was racing, and I couldn't stop it.

"Edward." Roy said, his voice struggling to stay level.

"I don't want to believe it." I told him without turning around.

"We don't know for sure if that's what he meant." Roy replied, trying to comfort me and probably himself.

"You didn't read the rest of his notes…" I said, my voice low.

He didn't answer right away, and when he did, his voice was barely more than a whisper. "What do you mean?"

I snapped at him. "There are dozens of entries after that that say how he brought people in and how Nora was always the test subject! He even says that he believed he succeeded at making the perfect homunculus! And that he would reuse the same method!"

"Ed, calm down. Someone here might hear you."

I took a deep breath, then turned and walked towards the door. "I'm going back to my hotel."

"You're going to walk there?" Roy asked

"Yes, I need the try and clear my head."

"Ed-" he started.

"Please Roy… Just leave me be for a while… I'll come back to the office in the morning."

He looked at me for a moment then nodded. "Okay, tell Al and bring him with you in the morning."

I nodded then left.

* * *

 _Back in the hotel room_

Al looked at me shocked and speechless after I finished recounting my day. His mouth hung open and his eyes were wide.

"No…" Was all he could manage to say.

I nodded. "I know… I wish it wasn't true, but it's the only explanation."

"Explanation for what?"

"Do you remember that time by the riverbed when you were first teaching Nora alchemy, and she made a mistake when drawing the transmutation circle, but she didn't notice until it was too late?" I asked

"Yeah. The rebound sent her flying backwards" he recalled.

"Yeah, it sent her right into the river, and we had to chase her downstream." I told him. "We saw the blood in the water as she was thrown around."

"I thought Winry was going to kill us for sure."

"Yes, well, I was the one who she threw the wrench at." I sighed slightly. "But that's not my point. By the time we got Nora, and pulled her out of the water, she only had a few small cuts that weren't bleeding."

Al thought back for a second. "Yeah you're right… But we saw a lot of blood, right?"

I nodded. "Yes, and when she hit the water, she hit her head, which was why we saw the blood."

Al nodded. "But when we found her, she didn't have a cut on her head."

"Because she healed herself. With a philosophers stone." I said, my voice level.

"But wait a second. Let's say that it's true, that she has a stone in her, what about when we found her and Valerie?"

My stomach knotted at the thought of the incident. "What about it?"

"Ed, Nora was missing her arm and leg. If she had a stone, why didn't they just grow back?"

I thought about it for a second. "Maybe her stone was too weak for it? Or maybe she doesn't know about the fact she has a stone."

"How is that possible? Not knowing that she has a stone?"

"Why would she know about her stone? It was put in her when she was a baby."

Al sighed. "I don't know… Maybe we should go back and look at Drayer's notes again."

"Yeah we can do that tomorrow, after we talk to Mustang."

Al nodded.

We sat there for a moment, when we heard a scream from next door in Nora's room, causing us both to jump up and run over.

"Nora?!" I called as Al and I ran into her room.

She was panting heavily and sitting upright. She looked over to us and opened her mouth to say something when she flinched and put her hands to her ears.

"Nora?" I went over and sat on her bed next to her. "Nora, what's wrong?"

She had her mouth clamped shut like she was in pain, and just shook her head.

"Please Nora. Tell us what's wrong." Al said.

Nora just shook her head again. Then suddenly she gasps and dropped her hands from her ears, and tried to catch her breath.

"Nora, are you alright?" I asked.

She gave me a slight nod. "I'm okay"

"Are you sure?" Al asked. "We heard you scream from the next room."

"Yeah? I'm sorry… It was just another nightmare." Nora said with a sigh.

"What was it about?" I asked, although I already knew the most likely answer.

"Um…" She paused. "The last thing I remember about it was seeing Valerie…"

I sighed. "Nora…"

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you guys up." Nora moaned softly.

"It's fine. We weren't sleeping anyway." I told her with a slight smile.

She gave me a small nod. "Still, I'm sorry."

"It's okay, really Nora." I leaned in and kissed her forehead. "Just try and go back to sleep."

She smiled slightly and nodded before laying down at quickly falling back asleep.

I looked at Al. "They're getting worse… The nightmares."

Al nodded. "I think so too."

I sighed and stood up. "I wish I knew how to help her…"

"I think in some ways, Valerie to her is equal to Nina for us." Al said looking down at Nora.

I sighed and looked at her too. He was right. Just as we were powerless to do anything to save Nina, Nora was powerless to do anything for Valerie. But what happened to the two of them was different then what happened with Al and I. We didn't see Nina get killed. Nora opened her eyes after the transmutation to find not only that she was missing limbs, but her sister was dead next to her, covered in blood and missing her heart.

I sighed. "Let's try and get some sleep too."

Al nodded. "Yeah, we're going to need it."

I looked at Nora one last time before walking out of the room.

* * *

I waited till I heard the door close before opening my eyes. I looked at the door in the dark and let out a huge sigh. They were right, my nightmares were getting worse, although I didn't really know why. I sat up and looked at my hands to watch the red sparks fly off my fingertips again.

I watched them for a minute. "That's more than last time…"

When the sparks finally stopped I swung my legs out of the bed and stood up. I looked around the room, and found I could see everything oddly clear, almost as if the lights were on, but I knew they weren't. I blinked a few times but nothing changed. I shrugged, thinking nothing of it, then got dressed. I put on black jeans and a black hoodie. After putting my hair up in a bun and my shoes on I left a note for Dad saying I was out on a run, just in case I didn't get back before he woke up.

I quietly made my way down and out of the hotel. Once I was outside, I just picked a direction and started running. It was three o'clock in the morning, so the streets were all but dead and the lamps dimly lit the way.

I didn't really pay attention to my surroundings, I just kept my eyes forward and made sure I wasn't completely lost in my thoughts so that I wouldn't run blindly into the middle of the street.

As I ran, I made a couple of turns just so that I wasn't running straight the whole time. But that turned out to be not the brightest idea. I ended up turning down an alley, and I hadn't noticed that a couple guys had started following me until I stopped in the alley to catch my breath.

"Well, what do we have here?" One of the guys spoke as they stopped in the opening of the alley.

I turned around but said nothing. The light from the street came from behind them and was too dim for me to be able to see their faces, but I could see their figures. There were five of them, and they all had similar builds, except the one in the middle. While all the others looked kinda scrawny, the one in the middle obviously had some muscle.

"What's a girl like you doing in a place like this?" The one in the middle stepped forward.

I bit my lip for a moment, trying to think of something to say that would make them go away, but nothing good enough came to mind.

"You don't have to be scared. We're not going to hurt you." Another one said. I couldn't see their mouths so I couldn't tell who was speaking.

"I'm not scared." I said, my voice surprisingly level.

"Good." One of them said, and it sounded like he said it with a smile.

"I made a wrong turn. But I know where I'm supposed to go, so if you'll excuse me…" I started to tell them.

"Well, why don't we walk you there?"

They were halfway to me now, and I knew they weren't just being friendly.

"I can manage on my own. Thank you through."

"Come on babe. Why don't you come and have some fun with us?"

The guy on the end closest to me reached out to put his hand on my shoulder. I grabbed his wrist and twisted his arm behind his back.

"Don't touch me." I said through my teeth.

The big guy in the middle cracked his knuckles. "Well, I guess we can't do this the easy way."

I twisted the guys arm I was holding harder till I heard it crack and he screamed out in pain. Then I let go and kicked him in the back causing him to fall to the ground. The others started to move toward me so I quickly clapped my hands together and put them to the dumpster next to me, and formed two daggers out of it, each long enough that the tips reached my elbows. I quickly took a defensive stance.

"You're an alchemist?!" The one farthest from me said, backing away slightly.

"Damn right." I said smiling.

"Alchemist or not," the big guy said reached behind his back. "You picked the wrong weapon." He pulled out a gun.

I felt my body tense up, but I didn't back down. I lunged towards him but kept my blades out and away from him. I hit him hard in the stomach and even knocked him back a few steps, but I couldn't knock him down. So while I was in close, I punched his ribs with my automail. I kept hitting him till I heard cracks.

He moaned then grabbed my waist and lifted me up and threw me.

I landed on my feet and one of the others guys went and put a knife through my automail shoulder, jamming it and making me unable to move it.

"Crap…" I muttered.

"Now we have you." The big guy said with a smile.

Then a shot rang out causing everyone to freeze up and turn to the opening of the alley.

There was a man standing at the opening of the alley, with what looked like a revolver in the air. "I suggest you gentlemen step away from her now."

I couldn't make out his face but his voice sounded familiar.

"And what's a scrawny guy like you with a little gun going to against five bigger guys?" The big guy asked.

The guy at the end of the alley started walking towards us. "I wouldn't advise underestimating me."

It was then I noticed it, the shadows in the alley were moving, and the other guys noticed it too.

"Boss…" One of them said, his voice shaking.

The big guy looked around. "I'm not scared of your illusion!" He called down the alley.

"Illusion? Oh no, what you're seeing isn't some mind trick, it's really happening." The man said back. "Now, I'll give you one more warning, step away from her."

"You don't scare me!" The big guy called at him again, this time running at him.

I stood there with the other men, and watched as the distance between them started to close, but the man at the end of the alley didn't move. Instead, he raised his hand and the shadows moved catching the man running at him and causing him to trip and fall to the ground.

"What the hell?" The big guy said as he tried to push off the ground, but couldn't.

"Don't try to move." He said. "You won't be able to."

"What the hell did you do?!"

"The shadows are holding you down." The man explained. "I told you not to underestimate me." He looked up from the one on the ground to the men that were still by me. "Now leave."

The remaining men scattered like frightened rats, even leaving the man on the ground behind.

"Hey! Where the hell are you guys going?!" He called from the ground.

"They're leaving. As should you." The other man said. The shadows that were holding the man down vanished and he was able to get up.

"If you think I'm leaving without landing a hit on you, then you're dead wrong!" He called and charged again.

I went to move, but my body was frozen. Not in fear, but in awe. I couldn't do anything and I was just forced to watch as a bigger man was picked up by his fist and thrown into a dumpster by someone who had to be at least half his size.

The big guy grumbled to the ground at the feel of the dumpster and didn't move after that, although I could tell he was still breathing.

The other man sighed as he started to walk towards me now. "I hate doing that, but you really didn't give me much of a choice." He looked at the man as he passed him, then he looked up at me.

My body still wouldn't move. I couldn't even get my brain to form a single thought.

"I'm not going to hurt you." He said, adding a smooth quality to his voice, probably to try and calm me down.

Finally my brain jump started. I took everything that had just happened in all at once and without realizing it I spoke aloud. "Pride."

The man stopped about two steps away from me. "What?"

I looked up at him, finally able to see his face clearly, it was the man from earlier in the day, the one I had saved on the street, the business card I had found in the money had said 'Salim King'. I had wondered where I knew the name 'Salim' from, and now I remembered.

"You're Salim Bradley, you're Pride." I said, my voice finally starting to shake.

He looked at me for a long moment before speaking. "Yes, I am." He kept his voice level. "But I'm not going to hurt you." He held out his hand. "Come with me, so I can get your arm fixed."

I looked at him, and tried to figure out what to do. Finally I nodded and took his hand. I figured if he did want to do any harm to me, he would have just attacked us all at once. Plus, Dad had said, that Salim didn't have any memory of what he did as the homunculus Pride, and that they kept him far away from people, just in case he regained his powers, so I never thought I'd run into him here in East City, not once but twice.

"Where are we going?" I asked as we walked out of the alley and down the street.

"My apartment isn't too far from here. I can fix up your arm there." He said without looking at me.

"You know how to fix automail?"

"I know the basics." He said as we stopped at a crosswalk, and waited for a few cars to pass.

I looked down and he was still holding my hand, and I felt blood rush to my face unintentionally.

He looked at me for a second out of the corner of his eye and smiled slightly but didn't comment.

We remained silent the rest of the way to his apartment and I felt my heart start pounding. I rolled my eyes at myself. _'Really? Why does my mind have to go there? Nothing is going to happen. He's going to fix my arm and probably give me a ride back to the hotel, since I don't know my way, and that's that'._ I told myself. _'Nothing will happen.'_

"Here we are." Salim had stopped walking in front of what looked like one of the nicest apartment buildings in town.

I nodded and pulled my hand out of his. "Great. You can lead the rest of the way without holding my hand." I said as I looked at the ground.

He laughed. "Nervous about going into an older man's apartment?" He asked.

"Shut up and lead the way." I grumbled.

He laughed again then pushed the doors to the building open and held them for me, I walked in and waited for him to follow and start leading me again. I followed close behind him and tried not to look around, but the lobby was luxurious, for lack of a better word. The floor was marble, and the ceiling had spots of gold leafing.

"Wow… This place is really nice…" I whispered.

"You can thank the state. They pay for my bills." Salim said as we got into an elevator.

"The state pays for you to be here?!"

"Yeah, but it's not like I asked for it. It was offered to me." He replied with a shrug.

"Well, I guess they do owe you, a lot."

He didn't reply to that, and we stood in the elevator in silence for the remainder of the ride.

We arrived at his floor and walked to the end of the hall where two soldiers flanked the door.

"Okay… What's with them?" I asked.

He sighed. "My bodyguards… Another perk from the state."

"Oh…"

"Just stay behind me, and try not to react weird to anything I might say."

"Okay?" I raised an eyebrow.

Salim sighed and we walked towards the door, until the soldiers saw us.

"Mr. King?!" One of the guards said, he was young and was a Private. He was a little shorter than Selim's and had dyed blonde hair.

The other guard just sighed. "You snuck out again?" He was Selim's height, and a Corporal. He had short dark red hair.

"Again?" The blonde looked at the other guard. "He's gotten out before?"

"Yeah, and no matter what I do, he always gets out."

"Sorry." Salim said, rubbing the back of his head and smiling sheepishly.

The redhead rolled his eyes. "Yeah yeah. Now who's the girl?" Both guards looked at me.

I gave them innocent smile, but stayed behind Salim.

"She's my guest." Salim said to the redhead, but the way he said 'guest' sounded as if he couldn't think of a better word to use.

I had to focus on my breathing to make sure that I didn't start blushing again.

The guards stared at me for a minute, till the redhead sighed. "Fine, go in, we won't bother you."

Salim smiled. "Thank you."

"Wait a second" the blonde stopped us and turned to the redhead. "You actually buy that this girl is a prostitute?"

I took a deep breath then spoke. "Why couldn't I be?"

Everyone looked at me, and Salim was trying to hide the horrified look on his face.

"Not all of us dress like tramps." I continued. "And by the way, we prefer the word 'escorts' rather than 'prostitute'. It sounds better."

They looked at me for a moment, then the redhead turned to the blonde. "Just let them in. It's fine."

"But sir-" the blonde tried to protest.

"Private. It's fine." He turned back to Salim. "Go on in."

"Thank you." Salim nodded and opened the apartment door and I followed him inside.

I stood and looked around the room, again awestruck, as Salim closed the door.

He let out a huge sigh. "That could have ended badly."

I nodded. "Yeah, I know."

"Then why speak up?"

"I figured it had to look like I wanted to be with you right? And he was saying I didn't look like an escort, so I acted as if I took insult from that."

"Yeah, but knowing the Private, he probably would have been like, 'well then, what are you wearing under that sweatshirt?'"

"Nothing." I answered.

Salim looked at me shocked. "What?"

I felt the blush come back to my face. "Um… Never mind. Are you going to fix my automail or not?"

Salim looked at me for a moment longer then chuckled and gestured to the couch. "Have a seat, and I'll see what I have."

"If you need something, I can always make it." I told him.

"You probably wouldn't know what the tools I might need look like."

"My mother is an automail mechanic. One of the best at that." I said as I tried to roll up my sleeve, although it wouldn't go over my shoulder.

"Oh really?" Salim asked as he looked through a chest that sat under the large window facing the street. "What's her name?"

"Winry Elric, but most people still know her by Rockbell."

Salim stiffened and turned slowly back to me. "Elric? Like Edward and Alphonse Elric?"

"Yeah… Edward is my father."

He looked at me confused and shocked.

"Oh, wow…" I rubbed the back of my head sheepishly. "I forgot to introduce myself didn't I?" I laughed at myself. "I'm Nora Elric."

"Oh, wow..."

"I'm sorry I didn't introduce myself sooner, I have no brain lately."

"It's okay." Salim smiled slightly as he came over to me holding a few tools. "So, your dad told you about me?"

"I've heard all of his stories about what happened to him and Al. Which of course includes you."

"Right." He sat down next to me. "Okay, I think have what I need to fix your arm, you just have to take off your sweatshirt."

I bite my lip and looked at the floor. "Um… I can't take it off…"

"Huh? Why not?"

"Um… Because… I'm not wearing anything underneath expect a bra…" I mumbled.

He looked at me for a long moment, then he started to laugh. "So you weren't kidding when you said you had nothing on underneath."

I blushed. "Shut up…"

He collected himself, then stood up. "Give me on second."

I looked down and the floor as he walked away. _'Now I feel stupid…'_

He came back a moment later and tossed a white button down shirt at me. "Here, you can put that one."

I looked at the shirt for a moment then back him. "Um, thanks… Can you turn around for a second?"

He nodded. "So, why were you out so early in the morning?" He asked as he turned his back to me.

"I woke up from a nightmare and needed some air." I said as I put on the shirt.

"I'm assuming your father doesn't know you're out."

"Yeah…" I sighed. "You can turn around."

He turned back to face me. "Can I ask what the nightmare was about?"

I looked at my hands. "It was about how I got my automail."

"Oh…" Salim looked at me, a little shocked. "So you weren't born needing it."

"No, I lost my arm and leg about a year ago."

"You have an automail leg too?"

"Yeah." I rolled up my left pant leg, showing him my leg. "The leg isn't damaged so you don't have to look at it."

"Can I ask another question?" Salim sat next to me and started looking at my arm.

"Yeah, what is it?" I said looking at the ground as he worked.

"How did you get your automail?"

I didn't answer right away. I didn't have to tell him, and there was no reason for me to. He was a stranger, and it was private information. But some part of me wanted to tell him, and I didn't know why, but I went with the former rather then that ladder.

"I'm not telling you that. It's none of your business."

"Fair enough." He replied, then suddenly disconnected my arm, causing me to groan in pain.

"Hey! You should have warned me before disconnecting!"

"Sorry. But there's a piece of the blade stuck in here" He told me. "It should only take a second for me to get it out, then I'll reconnect your arm."

I huffed. "Okay."

I looked at him as he worked to get the piece of the blade out. Then I noticed that he had a weird mark on his forehead that was normally hidden by his hair, it kinda looked like a hickey but it was very faint.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure." he replied without looking up. "What is it?"

"Do you remember anything from when you were Pride?"

His hands stopped moving for a second. "No." He said shortly. " I don't."

"Oh, okay."

He sighed. "Finally. I got it out." He held with tweezers a small piece of metal.

"That little piece jammed my whole arm?" I looked at it, a little amazed.

"It was stuck in the gear shift." Salim told him as brought my arm back over to me. "Ready? I'm going to reconnect you."

I nodded and closed my eyes as I waited for the click and the pain. The second my arm was reattached, I felt a flash of pain and the voices started screaming. I gasped and covered my ears.

"What? What's wrong?" I heard Salim ask, but it was muted by all the screaming.

"Mara! Mara, you have to listen to us!" They all called over and over again, till finally after a minute, they subsided. I sighed, relived.

"What the hell just happened?" Salim asked.

"Um..." I paused to try and think of a way to explain.

"What the hell?" He looked down at my hands, which had started to spark.

 _'Shit'_ I clenched my hand into fists and stood up abruptly. "I have to go." I put on my sweatshirt over the shirt Salim had given me and made my way to the door.

"Wait!" Salim caught me and grabbed my flesh arm and pulled me back a bit.

"Let go." I said turning back to him slightly.

Before Salim had a chance to say anything, a shockwave rolled down my arm, burning his hand.

"Damn it." He let go of me and looked at his hand then looked at me with a look of shock on his face.

I looked him for a second longer than ran out the door, without looking back.

I ran out of the apartment building and down the street before stopping to catch my breath. "Damn it!" I snapped at myself.

I looked around to make sure that Salim hadn't come out to follow me, then looked up at the sky and saw that the sun had started to rise. I sighed and started to walk down the street to find my way back to the hotel.

I eventually made it back to the hotel at 8 o'clock. I walked into the lobby exhausted.

"Nora!" someone called.

I turned around and saw Dad and Al coming out of the dining room.

"Nora, where have you been?" Dad asked as he approached me.

"Out for a run. I left a note." I told him.

Dad sighed. "What time did you leave for the run?" He asked.

"I don't remember."

"We went into your room around 6:30, and you were already gone." Al interjected.

"Then maybe I left around 6, like I said, I don't remember."

"Nora." Dad said annoyed. "What's your problem?"

"I just got back from a long run, I'd like to go upstairs and take a shower." I said, letting a little annoyance drip through my voice also.

Dad looked at me with narrowed eyes. "Don't talk to me like that."

"Well, if you'd just let me go upstairs, we wouldn't have this problems." I said rolling my eyes.

"Don't roll your eyes at me!" He snapped.

"Can I just go upstairs? I don't understand what exactly you think I did wrong." I snapped back.

"Where did you go?!" Dad asked, raising his voice slightly.

"Out. For. A. Run. How many times do I have to say it? If you want to know my exact route, I have absolutely no idea where I went. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going upstairs to take a shower now."

I turned to go upstairs, when Dad grabbed my arm. "I'm not done talking to you!"

I turned back quickly and pulled my arm away. "God Dad just let me go!"

I saw a slight flash of red but ignored it. Dad looked at me shocked and took a step back. I huffed then turned and went upstairs, completely unaware of what Dad just saw.


	16. Author's Note

Why I haven't uploaded Chapter 15

Hey to anyone who actually follows this story, this is to let you know that I'm not dead. I know it's been a while since I last updated, and I promise I'm not going to just let the story die here, I have every intention of finishing this story, no matter how long it takes. I am working on the next chapter, slowly. I haven't had a lot of time, I am a college student with a job, so I don't have much free time, plus I just can't seem to get the chapter to work the way I want it to. Maybe it's because my motivation isn't what is should be, or I'm not in an FMA head space, or something else, I really don't know. But my plan is to hopefully get the chapter done by the end of the summer, but I'm not sure that will happen till it happens. I hope you can wait a little longer, I want the chapter to be as close to perfect as I think it can be. I appreciate your support and patience thus far, and I hope you will stick around. What's to come will not disappoint (hopefully). Thanks again and I'll get back to work! See you around!


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